Violated....

Hiya,
Its your erratic blogger signing in today after like 2 weeks!! (Oh and I made up my mind to be consistent in my blogging this year!!)

It can only get better!! :-)

I hope you are all anticpating the 20th of January. I can only imagine how many parties would be going on around the world. I have been invited to soo many already. "Obama Inauguration extravaganza", "Celebrate history in Style", "Obama's official inauguration party", "Change is here", "Yes we Can party" lol (Ok, I came up with all those ridiculous names :-)
But yeah it's going down and it's going down in style! The whole world would be agog (at least more than half of the world population hopefully. I'm not quite sure Obama is a household name in Kotangora)

Anyways today's post is actually not about Mr Obama - just thought to keep up with what's News item at the moment. In the same vain, I just want to say a special THANK YOU to God for all the 155 passengers aboard the plane that crashed in New York yesterday. No life was lost and even observers have termed it "AMAZING". That's one of the names of our wonderful God!! Thank God that 155 families are not mourning at the moment!! THANK GOD!!

Now to the real "koko" of my post today. I recently watched on of my favourite Nigerian...actually scratch that, make that one of my favourite movies of all times - "VIOLATED". I was sooo excited when I stumbled upon it on youtube. You see, I had been looking for it for soo long and infact given up on ever watching it again until that fateful day lol...

So, after watching it, I started going over every bit of the movie in my head as I usually do. And I was thinking to myself how Mr Amadi (the uncle of the lead actress who raped her when she was younger)......Hmm actually it would make more sense if I actually wrote the synopsis of the movie but mehn it would be quite long cause I would probably give you every single detail, in the process killing the suspense for those who haven't had the good fortune of watching it (Have I mentioned how much I love that movie?? lol). So I will leave you to the joy of watching the movie first-hand! (Bear in mind it's a classic romance)

Yeah anyways, Mr Amadi didn't really get "very very" punished for his sins as much as I would have thought was due him. Yes his wife left with the son and he lost his job but I felt it wasn't enough cause he was not brought to justice. Then I thought again that this bit was probably one of the areas that made the movie realistic. Sad but realistic.

In Africa, it's sad that a lot of "uncles", "big bros" and the likes get away with rape (statutory and otherwise) almost on a daily basis wthout being brought to face the law.

Most times, the shame and stigma attached to being a victim of rape is enough to make one keep quiet about the incident. Other times, the victims are so young and naive that they do not understand the full meaning of what is going on and the extent of the crime. Sometimes, fear is a factor that makes the crime go unpunished. The perpetrator would instill such deep fear in his victim through threats and in some cases just his position of financial or familial security to the girl.

Another big obstacle to justice being served is that though I'm sure there's a provision for such a crime in the laws of the land, not many people are aware of it. Victims don't know what help is available to them, where to go for help and who to talk to...leaving no option for the victims who are even bold enough to speak up. Besides no one talks about it so victims are misled to believe that it must be the norm...

The victims bear the scars for a long time and in some cases for life. This unfortunate incidence stops them from achieving their potential , it lowers self-esteem and kills dreams before they are born. It's a very sad sad issue......but it still persists. I have met a numebr of girls who have been sexually abused in one form or the other usually by "close" family members or friends and their stories are disheartening. What's worse, the perpertrators are most often not ever found out by others never mind being brought to justice!

Something has to happen! We definately need a change! We need a massive campaign to bring this ugly crime to the knowledge of people. The governemnt owes it people that they serve this duty; to educate and empower. We need a stronger, tougher and uncompromising justice system for the perpetrators and an accesible, open, confidential help and counselling center for the victims.

This decay can and must end!

The truth is that although the justice system may fail sometimes, God never fails. Whatever a man sows that shall he reap. Anyone who thinks he has escaped the law can NEVER ever hide from God.

My heart goes out to everyone who has or is a victim of rape/sexual abuse. May God heal you completely of every hurt and pain that has been caused. May He embrace you with His everlasting love and make you feel free again. May He breathe on you a new lease of life and wipe out the ugly memories of the past. May He make you see the gift of today and the beautiful promise of tomorrow that you have in Him and that no one can take away from you. May He spoil you with His love and make you undertstand and experience true love.

God bless you, Lots of love xxxxxx