PART III Extent and Impact of Post Election Violence - Mars Group ...

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Commission would jeopardize their situation further. In addition, by the time the Commission was at the heart of its hearings, many of the victims residing at the camps and who would have had evidence to that effect, may have been relocated to other areas under the government programme ‘Operation Rudi Nyumbani’. Unintended Sexual Consequences of General Violence The Commission obtained evidence from two men, both residents of Kisumu, who were victims of police shooting. Although these did not present themselves as victims of sexual violence, the general violence of which they were victims had incidental sexual effects. In one case, Gregory Ngoche 232 testified that he was shot by the police while resting in his home with members of his family in Kisumu. He sustained injuries on his leg and was hospitalized for several days. As a result of the shooting, he suffered a sexual dysfunction. Another witness, John Apiyo, 233 testified that he worked as an askari in Kisumu and was shot from behind by a stray police bullet as they tried to deal with a riot within his place of work. He sustained an injury on his testicles from the shooting and now has a sexual dysfunction. Impact of the Victims’ Health and Socio-Economic Conditions Victims of the post election sexual violence experienced a number of unintended consequences in the aftermath of being attacked which the Commission heard about from witnesses who testified and from those who did not but nevertheless gave statements to its investigators. These consequences included infection with HIV/Aids, physical injury and psychological trauma, desertion by their spouses, unwanted pregnancy, and loss of trust that they might have had previously in state security agencies. Some victims of sexual violence already had HIV/ AIDs and others contracted it as a result of being raped and being unable to access medical services in time to reduce the chances of or prevent infection. In addition, witnesses told the Commission that even when they advised their perpetrators of their HIV AIDS 232 CW 104 233 CW 93 261
status and showed them their medication, their attackers went on to rape or gang rape them, thereby perversely choosing to risk becoming infected themselves. As Millicent Obaso, of Care Kenya explained, “Some of the women declared to the perpetrators that they were HIV positive, but the men ignored and went ahead and raped them. My Lord, this is very dangerous because most of the perpetrators, the youth gang, were between 20 and 25 years. They have spouses or they are planning to marry or have wives and they may be spreading this virus, but who knows, maybe some of these perpetrators themselves were HIV+ and they also infected the women they raped who were not HIV+. I would urge my lord that you monitor the HIV/AIDS prevalence in Mathare and Kibera over the next one year or two years to see to what extent the prevalence is going up”. 234 This same point was reinforced by Dr. Samuel Thenya, who explained that there “are those who are on HIV treatment or who [were] HIV positive and they were sexually assaulted. Now call it poetic justice or what you may, but it means that the person who assaulted them then has also been exposed to HIV/AIDS. And of course the perpetrators did not come to us. So you have a group of people out there who assaulted others who are HIV positive and therefore have been infected with HIV/AIDS”. 235 Many victims of sexual violence were injured extensively and suffered enormous psychological trauma. A Mathare resident told the Commission that those who circumcised her also cut her vagina to the extent that the attending doctors told her it was impossible to stitch her and instead gave her a drug. A 36 year old woman from Eldama Ravine told the Commission that when she was gang raped: 234 CW 10 235 CW 142 “it was either the second or the third man who said that he was not able to get into me properly so they cut me. I think it was the panga 262
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Page 3 and 4: election violence. At the very leas
Page 5 and 6: providing victims with medical, psy
Page 7 and 8: psychologist to interact with and a
Page 9 and 10: Mecca for women. They discussed the
Page 11 and 12: police stations, loss of property,
Page 13 and 14: eceive its “comprehensive service
Page 15 and 16: The people whom the Commission hear
Page 17 and 18: involving the 4 by the GSU, 2 by Ad
Page 19 and 20: at the door, the other two got in.
Page 21 and 22: themselves, but also of deliberate
Page 23 and 24: violence would easily happen again.
Page 25: violence. As a 40 year old married
Page 29 and 30: penis]’”. 241Some victims of se
Page 31 and 32: meant that law and order increasing
Page 33 and 34: Legal issues arising from sexual vi
Page 35: That said, in all societies sexual

PART III Extent and Impact of Post Election Violence - Mars Group ...

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