Sexual violence victims narrate their ordeal in fight for justice

She was only 12 when in a single and brutal moment, her innocence was cruelly torn away by a man old enough to be her father.

Her only “sin” was being born into poverty. The space where she was meant to be safe, with people her mother relied on for protection, was the very place where her childhood was ruined. Her childhood was stolen, her spirit scarred, and the betrayal left a deep wound.

This is the story of Precious. A girl defiled by a neighbour in Nairobi. Their house had been locked by the landlord due to unpaid rent arrears. Precious was accommodated by her mother’s female friend and their neighbour while the mother went out to seek shelter elsewhere. Precious was defiled by the lover of her mother’s friend.

“I was in the house studying. He came back from work and sat next to me on the couch and started touching me. I tried to escape but he held me and put a knife on my neck and threatened to kill me if I said a word,” she narrated.

The knife was meant to silence and subdue her. The man had the freedom to commit any evil he desired. “I could not scream; I was so scared. He took me to the bedroom and defiled me. He later let me go,” Precious recounted.

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A neighbour spotted her crying and inquired what had happened. She would then call the girl’s mother.

The matter was reported at Makongeni Police Station before she was taken to hospital for assessment.

“Sometimes when I remember that incident I just cry because he ruined my childhood and my life. I just wish he could be arrested and be jailed,” she said.

“I had disclosed to my teacher about it and I could talk to her when I felt overwhelmed. I do not know if the teacher reported the case,” she added.

At that time, Precious was in Standard Six and more than three years later, the painful memory is still fresh.

Her tormentor was known to her. Before the ordeal, he was threatening “to do bad things to her” and warned her never to tell anyone.

Precious was robbed of her innocence in a painful and traumatic ordeal, but the universe still conspired to frustrate her pursuit of justice. “I told the police officer everything that had happened and she told us to go home, they would follow up on the matter,” she narrated.

According to Precious’ mother *Angeline, the police scolded her for what had befallen her daughter adding that the perpetrator was never arrested and the case collapsed. “The police blamed me for neglecting my daughter. They told me, kama hamtaki kuangalia watoto wenu, sasa tutawasaidia aje (If you don’t want to look after your children, how can we help you?” That really pained me,” she decried.

What hurts the most is that what befell her daughter was the same predicament she faced when she was 14 and led to the birth of baby Precious. “I was defiled as a child but nobody ever took action. I had to navigate through motherhood at a tender age. I even dropped out of school,” she recounted.

According to Grace Wangari, a psychologist, a lack of proper handling of sexual violence has a lifelong implication on the victims, especially children. “The implication sexual violence carries along through adulthood and If it is not addressed in the childhood stage, it can form a developmental problem that can affect the victims for rest of their lives,” said Wangari.

She added: “Sexual violence rips you of your dignity. It takes away your voice and the children can develop symptoms of mental health problems.”

Blaming victims, says Wangari, makes them also believe it was their fault that they were assaulted.

The pain of Angeline and her daughter of undergoing  Gender Based Violence (GBV) with little or no help from the system resonates with that of *Catherine, a 12-year-old gir, repeatedly defiled by a man but no action has been taken by police.

The minor who resides in Kayole, was spied by a man and one evening he lured her with mobile phone games before robbing her of her innocence.

It started with a phone and then unsolicited car rides and what followed was her worst nightmare.

For ten days she was violated and desecrated again and again. “I was playing with my friends around 6pm. The man called me and told me to go to Stepa, where he had parked his car,” Catherine explained.

Like a moth fatally attracted to a burning lamp, Catherine hesitantly approached the car. “When I got to Stepa, he told me to get into the car and gave me his phone to play a video game. He undressed himself and forcefully undressed me and defiled me,” she recounted. “I screamed and cried for help because it was so painful, but he kept doing it. When he was done, he told me to put on my clothes, gave me a Sh100, and told me to go back home,” added the girl. 

Her tormentor was known to her. After each day’s session, the perpetrator, old enough to be her father and four times her age would thrust a Sh100 note as if to atone for his indescribable act. “The second time, he forcefully undressed me, then undressed himself and did bad things to me. It was so painful. When he was done, he wiped me, gave me a Sh100 and told me to go home. He also told me that he was travelling to the village,” Catherine narrated.

The man is reportedly a businessman in Soweto in Kayole where he runs a shop and sells secondhand household items and electronics.

Just like Precious, Catherine has never gotten justice despite medical results from mama Lucy Hospital ascertaining that she was defiled.

“The case was reported at Soweto Police Station by my parents and the chief. The man was arrested but he was later released under unclear circumstances,” said Catherine.

For 16-year-old Claire, a Form Three student to get justice for sexual assault perpetrated by her neighbour, she has to be on the lookout for the perpetrator.

According to her, the incident took place in September 2023 and was reported at Soweto Police Station, but never proceeded to court after the perpetrator fled.

“We reported the matter at the post but the police told me since there was no need of going to hospital for an assessment because he had not penetrated,” Claire narrated.

The burden of tracing the perpetrator was left on the shoulders of Claire and her mother, a waste picker, since the police told them to report if they spotted him.

“We have never gone back to the police station because the man threatened me and my mother that he would kill us if we keep following up on the case,” said the minor.

As the 16 Days of Activism end, activists, advocates and other stakeholders point to hesitant and flawed police investigations as key obstacles in the battle against GBV and protection of victims.

Shantal Valerie Anyango, a legal officer at The Cradle, said police have been a major challenge in the prosecution of sexual offences.

“One of the biggest frustrations is the police because they are dismissive of these cases. We are also pushing to have policed be held accountable when they don’t deal with cases appropriately,” said Anyango.

For Annette Mchiti, 30, who was physically and sexually assaulted by a man, her experience with police was also unpleasant.

Having successfully escaped from the jaws of death where a man known to her held her captive in undisclosed location and repeatedly assaulted her at gun point, getting to a police station was supposed to be a relief but it turned out to be a nightmare.

“I told the police what had happened but I remember one of the officers scolded me saying ‘wewe umekuwa ukikula pesa ya mwanaume alafu unakataa mwanaume! (You have been spending a man’s money, and now you are rejecting him!).

One of them dismissed the matter saying the case was not substantial. She gave her statement and was instructed to return after a few hours. Despite revealing the man’s workplace to the police in hopes of assistance, nothing changed.

“He kept following me and spying on me, but the police just told me to contact them if I saw him. He was eventually arrested, but the police released him, saying there was no case. In the end, I had to quit my job out of fear that he would continue to follow me,” she said.

As part of the ongoing amendment of the Sexual Offences Act 2006 by The Cradle, Anyango said if successful, parents, teachers and anyone interacting with children will have a duty to report where they have knowledge of sexual offences.

She also took issue with the ineffectiveness of the gender desk at the police station. According to the lawyer, the units have been reduced to storage rooms.

“A lot of gender desks are not functional if they exist at all. A lot of them are rooms where extra furniture is being kept, sometimes the officer in charge of the desk is not trained and if you are lucky to find a gender desk your privacy is still not observed,” she said.

“The victims are referred back to the booking desk to get the Occurrence Book number where everyone one else is reporting their cases. You find yourself on line with someone there for a traffic offence and you’re supposed to recount your ordeal there,” she decried.

Gender desks were established in 2004 to handle and investigate cases of sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV).