The Registration of Sex Offenders Bill seeks to establish the register of sex offenders to help monitor sex offenders in the community and reduce sexual offenses.

The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Justice, Law and Human Rights is currently holding public consultations in the North to get comments on the Bill as well as raise awareness on the proposed legislation.

Committee Chair, Alvick Maharaj says while the Bill has received overwhelming support, communities they’ve visited have nonetheless expressed their concern about the prevalence of serious sexual crime in Fiji.

 “In regards to the Bill which is not directly related to the Bill is about the decaying of our society, as to why these rape cases they take place in the first place, that is one of the major concerns that we have actually received almost everywhere we have actually collected with regards to this actual Bill”.

According to the Bill, convicted sex offenders will be required to report relevant personal information about them for inclusion in the register which they will have to keep up to date with periodic reporting.