How New Sexual Harassment Bill Protects Female Students From Randy Lecturers

Female students in Nigeria’s tertiary institutions may soon have a new lease of life if a bill recently passed by the Senate becomes law.

The bill titled Sexual Harassment of Students (Prevention and Prohibition) Bill, 2025 (HB.1597), which prescribes a 14-year jail term for any educator guilty of sexually harassing their students, was approved by the Senate on November 5.

A 2018 survey by the World Bank Group’s Women, Business, and the Law project found that 70 per cent of female graduates in Nigeria had experienced sexual harassment in school, most commonly from classmates and lecturers.

Punch also reported in May that no fewer than 50 lecturers across Nigerian public tertiary institutions have been indicted for sexual misconduct between April 2021 and April 2025.

But the new bill, if signed into law, offers protection for students from all forms of sexual misconduct and abuse within academic environments.

A copy of the bill seen by THE WHISTLER has expanded the definition of sexual harassment to include whistling or winking at a female student or making “sexually complimentary remarks.”

Section 3(a) of the bill says an educator shall be guilty of committing an offence of sexual harassment if he/she:

(i) has sexual intercourse with a student or demands for sex from a student or prospective student; or

(ii) intimidates or creates a hostile or offensive environment for the student by soliciting for sex from the student or by making sexual advances towards a student; or

(iii) directs or induces another person to commit any act of sexual harassment under the provisions of this Bill, or conspires with another person in the commission of sexual harassment by another person without which it would not have been committed; or

(v) grabs, hugs, kisses, rubs or strokes or touches or pinches the breasts or hair or lips or hips or buttocks or any other part of the body of a student; or

(vi) displays, requests, gives or sends by hand or courier or electronic or any other means, explicit or suggestive pornographic messages, whether by text, pictures or videos or other sex related objects to a student; or

(vii) whistles or winks at a student or screams or exclaims or jokes or makes sexually complimentary or uncomplimentary remarks about a student’s physique or stalks a student.

A lecturer who commits any of the listed offences is deemed guilty whether the student victim consented to it or not.

Section 3(d) also provides that “it shall not be necessary for the prosecution to prove the intention of the accused person or the condition under which the act was carried out.”

How to Report sexual harassment on campus

Victims of sexual harassment on campuses have the option of reporting to their school authorities, the police or the attorney-general of the state where the institution is located, or to the Attorney-General of the Federation.

criminal proceedings against a lecturer can only commence after a written sexual Harassment petition made by a student or by a student’s representative (who may be a relative, a guardian, or a lawyer of the student, or any person who has interest in the well-being of the student) has been filed with the Nigerian police force, or the Attorney-General of the state or the federation.

It is the police or the attorney-general who is expected to take necessary measures to prosecute the educator in accordance with the provisions of the Bill.

But the Bill also provides for internal disciplinary measures within an institution, notwithstanding the offender’s trial in court. The bill makes it mandatory for all tertiary institutions to set up an independent Sexual Harassment Committee for internal investigation.

A copy of the written sexual Harassment Petition by an aggrieved student is also to be submitted to both the administrative head of the institution and the secretary of the institution’s independent Sexual Harassment Committee for internal investigation.

“Criminal proceedings shall commence or be deemed to have commenced under this Bill when a charge has been filed in court and the processes served on an educator who Is alleged to have committed a sexual harassment offence under this Bill,” it states.

Penalties

On penalty, it says, “Any person who commits any offence or acts specified in clause 4(1),(2), and (3) of this Bill is guilty of an offence of felony and shall, on conviction, be sentenced to an imprisonment term of up to 14 years but not less than 5 years, without an option of fine.”

If the head of an institution where sexual harassment has been committed against a student refuses to act in accordance with the provisions of the bill, he is “guilty of an offence and shall be liable on conviction to a minimum fine of N5,000,000 (five million naira) or imprisonment for five years or both.”

If a lecturer investigated by his institution’s independent sexual harassment committee is found guilty of the alleged offence, he could face dismissal or a reduction in rank.

To protect students against victimisation by school authorities, the bill stipulates that “any educator or person in an institution where sexual harassment is alleged or in another institution who victimises a student in respect of a complaint shall be liable to the same criminal sanctions, disciplinary punishment or damages as the educator whom the student originally complained against.

But the bill, which was opposed by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) for targeting lecturers, also recommends sanctions against students found to have made false accusations against a lecturer, which may include suspension.

Bamidele explained that the bill is designed to provide clear legal frameworks for the enforcement and punishment of offenders.

The bill was presented for concurrence at the senate by the Senate Leader.