Although
raped men rarely speak about their experience, activists in Uganda are
determined to help victims by setting up support groups, as well as
advocating for legal reform and a precise definition of male rape.
In
Uganda's Gulu district, located about 340 kilometers north of the
country's capital Kampala, local people have always been soft targets –
ever since the country gained independence in 1962.
For 20 years the northern region of the country endured attacks by different rebel groups fighting against government forces.
During
that time, civilians were raped, abducted, forcibly conscripted into
rebel groups, with hundreds forced to flee their homes for safety in
refugee camps.
"How do I tell my wife?"
Juma,
(not his real name) was among the unlucky ones who did not make it to
safety. Coming from a remote area of Gulu he was abducted in 1987, at
the age of 52.
"I
was taken out of my house where I was sleeping by government troops.
They were soldiers. When they pushed me out, my wife was inside. These
people started to harass me and then raped me," Juma said.
Now
78-years-old, Juma was not the only one sexually assaulted by the
Ugandan Army and he has never talked openly about his ordeal.
At least until last year when he met other men from different conflict areas and who had a similar experience to him.
Alex
(not his real name), a Congolese nation, is currently living in Uganda
as a refugee. He finds it difficult to talk to his wife about what he
went through.
"How
do I tell my wife I was raped? What is she going to think about me? She
won't see me as a man again. She will start looking at me like any
other woman," Alex told said.
Often
used as a weapon of war, rape against men is rarely spoken about
publically in Africa. African men are brought up to be strong people,
the ones who provide security for their families.
The
mindset is often that when a man is raped, the deepest core of his
existence, his emotional and physical might is crushed. Another rape
victim, from Eastern DRC, decided to tell his wife he had been raped
while in Congo.
To
this day, he regrets telling her the truth. "I told my wife what
happened to me, as a result, I lost my strength as a man and I was
unable to perform my conjugal duties like before," he said.
There
remains no reliable statistics indicating how widespread the crime of
rape is in Africa's conflict areas. A non-government organization
providing legal aid to asylum seekers and refugees in Uganda is
spearheading a project to reach out to men who have been raped.
Chris
Dolan, director of the Refugee Law Project, explained the numbers of
men experiencing rape are much higher than anticipated.
Ugandan government forces were allegedly involved in commiting crimes of sexual violence
"We
started talking to a handful of male survivors from one of the
settlements and they started to meet up and now they have close to 60
members – all within the space of just three months," Dolan said.
"Similarly
here in Kampala we have an association we started with six men and now
it has around 70 members and those are only the ones that actually want
to join the association. We have clients that do not want to go to our
support group," Dolan added.
Support
groups provide victims with counselling services and medical care. They
also strive to create an environment where the survivors can talk
freely about their experiences.
Dolan
says the next step for the organization is to advocate for legal reform
so a definition pertaining to sexual violence against men becomes
enshrined in law.
"We
don't want to go to court and be told no we cannot handle you as a rape
case because there is no such thing as male rape. We are also trying to
get changes in the educational curriculum. We want medical students to
be trained to adequately deal with such situations," Dolan added.
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