While a peace agreement has apparently been brokered in Kenya, what has apparently not been taken into account (or at any rate has not been mentioned in the news reports) is how to make peace for the many women and children who have been brutally raped in the post-election violence. This despite the fact that the peace agreement was brokered by Kofi Annan, who as the former head of the United Nations should surely have been expected to frame these negotiations in keeping with United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 which mandates consideration of the welfare of women in all peace negotiations. In an excellent piece in Kenya’s Daily Nation, Rasna Warah examines the aftermath of the violence for these all but unrecognized victims.
“The poet, Marge Piercy, describes rape as being no different from “being pushed down a flight of cement steps, except that the wounds also bleed inside” or “going head first through a windshield except that afterwards you are afraid not of cars, but of half the human race”.The stories of all the women, men, girls and boys raped in the post-election violence may never be told or reported, as many of the victims are probably too frightened to report the crime or too emotionally distraught to go through Kenya’s unresponsive medical, legal and judicial systems.
However, forensic scientists and investigators from the Crime Scene Investigators group claim that in the last two months, Kenya had more cases of rape than at any other time in its history.
The group claims that since December 30, the incidence of rape in the country nearly tripled.
In Nairobi alone, there were more than 500 reported cases, of which 60 per cent of the victims were minors under the age of 18 (the youngest victim was just nine months old!) and nearly 10 per cent were men.
A majority of the victims were gang raped.
One report even suggested that at least five women were being forcibly circumcised every week in some parts of the country. Meanwhile, in places such as Naivasha and Nakuru, women wearing trousers were being harassed.
Sexual abuse of girls within the camps for internally displaced people have also been reported. As if this was not bad enough, some children in the camps became victims of human traffickers, who lured the children, mostly teenage girls, out of the camps and offered them food in exchange for sex.
People have also been seen recruiting domestic workers at the camps, forcing the Red Cross in Nakuru to put up a sign that states that the camp is not a recruiting ground for cheap labour. Yet none of our political leaders, male or female, raised a word against these acts.“
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