Raped and left for dead by ‘security’ escort

Curious: Members of the public peep into a police vehicle to view the body of a woman who was raped and killed at Kambi Nguruwe in Langas Estate, Eldoret Town. PHOTO/ FILE

By Walter Menya

The three hour rape at the hands of the very people who were supposed to protect her can never get out of Mary’s (real name withheld) memory no matter how hard she tries.

Tears have become a common feature in her life since that night of Friday, April 2, when two night guards she had hired to escort her raped her and left her for dead in Ngara.

Regained consciousness

It was Saturday at 1am when she regained consciousness. A Good Samaritan took her to Guru Nanak Hospital. The staff referred her to Blue House Clinic which deals with Sexual and Gender Based Violence in Mathare slums.

She was treated at the clinic run by Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders). She is still under treatment.

Mr Michael Njuguna, a social worker at the clinic, recounts Mary’s condition when he brought her in. “I got a phone call, called for a taxi to the place.

“I saw a traumatised lady crying and blaming herself. Her self-esteem was gone.”

Mary’s ordeal is hardly an isolated case in Nairobi’s slums. A 2010 Amnesty International study shows that more than half the women in slums have experienced physical, sexual or psychological violence.

The report, Insecurity and Indignity: Women’s Experiences in the Slums of Nairobi, found that perpetrators of these abuses include youth gangs, intimate partners, family members, employers and security personnel.

The study was conducted in Kibera, Mathare, Korogocho, Mukuru kwa Njenga and Korogocho slums between November 2009 and February 2010.

The situation is compounded by the lack of police presence in the slums. For instance, Kibera with a population of close to a million people does not have a single police station, Amnesty says in the report.

Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) opened Blue House in June 2001 to offer integrated HIV and TB care in Mathare slums.

Following the post-election violence in December 2007, sexual violence has become the daily challenge the medical staff have to contend with. They now operate 24-hours.

MSF treats between 20 and 40 survivors every month, many of them children.

Clinical officer Subayla Aboud said: “It is sometimes overwhelming. We have seen an 86-year-old woman and a six-month-old baby brought here after they were raped. But girls of school-going age tend to be more,” she added.

As she speaks, about 15 girls play outside awaiting their turn with Ms Subayla. They are victims of rape who have come for follow- up services. Some of them, Ms Subayla says, had contracted Aids and have been placed on the clinic’s HIV and TB care.

Source: Daily Nation