25 January, 2008: In October 2007, Jeffrey Gettlemanan brought to light through his article in the New York Times entitled “Rape Epidemic Raises Trauma of Congo War,” difficult to bear realities. The article told of stories of hundreds of women and girls who have been the victims of brutal sexual violence as part of the conflict that has been tearing the Congo apart for years. It seemed to genuinely capture the nation’s attention: the details of this piece were discussed in university classrooms and around water coolers and even linked to on, of all things, media and celebrity gossip blogs.
While the events in question captivated the country for a moment, little has been said since on the subject in the mainstream media. But whether western media outlets report on it or not, extreme instances of rape are daily occurrences in conflict-torn areas, especially in sub-Saharan Africa. What’s more, negative effects of such violence continue on long after the public stops reading.
Rape has been an instrument of war for as long as conflicts have existed. Rape is most often used as a tool of intimidation against civilians. Unfortunately as warfare has evolved, so have forms of sexual brutality. One of the more recent terms to be added to the lexicon of war crimes is that of “genocidal rape.” This term has become synonymous with the conflicts in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. What makes genocidal rape so troublesome is its systematic and societal nature. According to Laura Sjoberg and Caron E. Gentry, authors of 2007’s Mothers, Monsters, Whores: Women’s Violence in Global Politics and experts on gender and international violence, “whereas rape can be considered an assault against and individual body . . . genocidal rape is the systematic rape of women and girls in wartime as a tactic to subdue and conquer a people.”
Areas of sub-Saharan Africa which are currently experiencing or have recently emerged from conflict, such as Sierra Leone, the Congo, Darfur, Uganda and others, have also encountered high rates of sexual violence. In addition, countries such as South Africa, which are considered peaceful, still own some of the highest rates of reported sexual violence in the world.
What makes rape such a unique and troubling aspect of conflict is that its harmful effects do not linger only in the present moment; they linger on long after the initial act has ended, both for the individual victim and the society as a whole.
In terms of rape victims, the process of victimization carries on for years; the pain stemming from the first instance of violence can recur over and over again. In addition to the physical effects of sexual violence—including sexually-transmitted infections, anxiety attacks, and damage to reproductive systems—victims experience social and psychological ailments that can last long after their visible wounds have healed. Many female victims of rape, especially in traditional societies such as many of those in sub-Saharan Africa, are shunned by fathers and husbands after the fact.
Even in the pursuit of justice and an outlet through which to share their tragic stories, victims often find themselves reliving past pain and experiencing the opening of new wounds. The circumstances under which female victims of sexual violence testify about their ordeals at truth commissions in post-conflict areas have been highlighted in the press and scholarly writings.
In her book on South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) following the end of apartheid entitled Country of My Skull, Antjie Krog, a prominent South African journalist and author, devoted an entire chapter of the book to the subject; under the heading “Truth is a Woman.” In this chapter Krog quotes Nomfundo Walaza, a clinical psychologist, as saying that “women who have been raped know that if they talk about it [rape] in public, they will lose something again—privacy, maybe respect.” In societies in which rape victims are looked down upon and viewed as defiled, simply getting one’s story out may destroy a woman’s prospects of future success and dignity.
One of the most disturbing trends that comes in the aftermath of conflicts in which sexual violence is widespread, is the transformation of societal norms so that violence against and the degradation of women becomes more acceptable. Gettlemen explains in his piece that now, even as the conflict in the Congo continues, observers are noting that the atmosphere within Congolese society is experiencing “reversed values” and is changing so that brutality towards women is now being seen as “almost normal.”
This fact is often overlooked when it comes to transitional justice and post-conflict nation-building. In a report compiled by Physicians for Human Rights entitled War-Related Sexual Violence in Sierra Leone: A Population-Based Assessment, the reintegration of former soldiers after the civil war in that country became a concern. The report states that, “thousands of former combatants who have spent years murdering and raping are returning to their communities without punishment or accountability for their crimes to live among women and children who are likely traumatized.” The lesson here may very well be that once one has reached the point where he or she is capable of committing such atrocities, it may become difficult to revert back to a life of peace and social stability. When victims live side-by-side with their unrepentant attackers, it is difficult to claim that any true sense of peace or reconciliation has been achieved.
There is hope for the future, however. One suggested way of preventing a shift in cultural values is the very visible punishment of rapists after a conflict has ended in order to clearly define post-conflict attitudes toward sexual violence. Regardless of the method used, it is becoming more and more apparent that it is important to address the effects of sexual violence in post-conflict reconstruction in order to prevent the distortion of sub-Saharan African, and all post-conflict area societies, into a space which is hostile towards all women and where brutality is viewed as socially acceptable. |
