Cases of defilement and incest are now common in the Tano North Municipality of the Ahafo Region, Madam Angelina Aboagyewaa Appiah, the Tano North Municipal Director of the Social Welfare Department has said.
She said the municipality had since January 2025 recorded five cases of defilement, mostly linked to incest, saying that alcoholism and substance abuse were identifiable factors that influenced the perpetrators to commit the crime.
Madam Appiah said though perpetrators had been prosecuted, many of the cases remained unreported because the victims and their families feared societal stigmatisation.
She added that certain belief systems and poverty were also fueling transactional sex, and child marriage and teenage pregnancy in the municipality, and called for stakeholder support to bring the situation under control.
