KAKUMA’S WOMEN: LIVING IN FEAR
SAMMY MURAYA
NAIROBI, KENYA

(BATTLEFIELD SOUND)  

MURAYA:
War has driven them out of their countries.
They now live in the Kakuma refugee camp.
The camp is far way from Nairobi.
Almost a thousand kilometers.
The camp houses tens of thousands of refugees.
They’re all from war-torn East African countries.  
Most of them are from Sudan and Somalia.
Rape cases in the camp are extremely high.

MARY (VOICE OVER):  
Three men broke into my house at around 3am and they had guns and they forced me to open the door for them. And they told me they wanted money. I told them that I did not have any. And then I tried to plead with them not to hurt me. But to no avail. They told me that if I did not have money they were going to rape me. I pleaded even more. And as I was doing so, one of the men tore off my clothes and started raping me, as the two other men kept watch with their guns ready to shoot any refugee who tried to help me.

MURAYA:
Mary is a mother of four.
She encountered this ordeal two years ago.
Before the rape she had only three children.
Now she has four.
The last born is a handsome boy.
But, to her eyes he is a nightmare.
A nightmare that she’s faced with for the rest of her life.
She got this baby from one of the rapists.

(STREET SOUNDS)

MURAYA:
One of the many food collection points in Kakuma.
People here are not allowed to work.
They’re foreigners without working permits.
Refugees get their food from the World Food Program.
They collect it from these points.
But it’s rarely safe to walk there, particularly at night.
Jane and Alice are sisters. 
A few months ago, they had to fetch their ration.  
Along the way, they were stopped by 5 Dinka boys.  
The sisters tried to fight them.
But to no avail. 

JANE (VOICE OVER):  
One of the men sodomized me. Then when he was through he called on to one of his other friends who raped me. When they were finished, they told me to run and so I ran so fast. So, I did not even think about my sister at that time. All I wanted was to get away from those beasts.
 
MURAYA:
Jane ran for her life.
Bystanders took her to a hospital to be treated.
Her sister Alice was not as lucky.
Her hospital had no doctor.

ALICE (VOICE OVER):  
When I went to hospital all I was given was Panadol. I was told to wait for the doctor who was not around at that time. I waited and waited and then I asked about the doctor again. And I was told that he was busy in a meeting and so I had to go home.

MURAYA:
Alice never went back to the hospital.
No doctor did a rape examination on her.
She’s not the only one.
Mary, whom we heard of earlier in this story, also ended up without someone to attend to her.  

MARY (VOICE OVER):
I went to hospital and I was told that they were still on holiday and so I could not receive any treatment. I was angry and so I did not go back.

MURAYA:
Mary, Alice and Jane are very likely to have contracted HIV during the rapes.  
Some people believe the HIV rate in Kakuma to be as high as sixty percent.  
But none of these three women know their HIV-status.
The stigma attached to HIV keeps them from going for tests.

ALICE (VOICE OVER):
 I don’t want to go for a HIV test, because if I learn that I am HIV positive people in the camp will know and they will begin pointing fingers at me saying “there is the HIV positive woman” … and I will have no friends in this camp and I don’t want that.

MARY (VOICE OVER):
Right now people already hate me in the community. I have no friends. No one talks to me and the worst thing is that no one, no one wants to hold my baby. It would be worse if they were to find out that I am HIV-positive.

MURAYA:
Stigma at the Kakuma refugee camp is so bad that out of almost one hundred thousand people living in the camp, only one has gone public about his HIV-positive status.
Like most of Kakuma’s residents, Mary, Jane and Alice prefer living in the dark.  
Living without knowing whether they are HIV-positive or not.
HIV-related stigma stands between them and an HIV test.
This report was prepared for a stitch in time by Samuel Muraya.