Zelpa Repent thought that being hit with a stick by her husband Mustafa was “normal”. She stayed with him even when, after one beating during her first pregnancy, she lost her baby. In southern Sudanese culture, a woman does not leave her husband, even if he is violent. She must endure, or so Zelpa thought.

A few months after losing her first child, Zelpa, 30, fell pregnant again, but the beatings did not stop. Mustafa, 40, was bursting into violent rages nearly every week. She had to go to hospital for treatment three times. “He would hit me with a stick like that,” says Zelpa, nodding towards a two-inch thick tree bough on the ground a few feet away.

It is hard to imagine now, sitting in Zelpa’s peaceful yard in Lui, three hours north of the southern Sudanese capital Juba. The palms are swaying and she is surrounded by well-tended fields of cassava and sorghum, but sometimes Zelpa’s husband would grab the machete they used at harvest time and shout: “I will kill you!” Zelpa would run for her life into the forest. Sometimes, after the beatings, she would go to her parents’ house, but after two or three days they always told her she must go back.

One night, in late 2007, when Zelpa was seven months’ pregnant, Mustafa demanded to have sex with her. Zelpa felt afraid. “I’m so heavy, how can I?” she begged. Her husband was furious and beat her so that she was hurting all over.

This time, she could take no more. The next morning, badly bruised, she walked three miles to find the village chief, whose job it was to mediate disputes. She believed he would judge the case fairly.

But when she arrived, she found her husband had got there first, and complained to the chief his wife had refused to sleep with him. Far from providing the voice of reason, the chief sided with her husband. “Why do you refuse your husband, even if you are heavy?” he demanded. Zelpa was not allowed to speak. Far worse than that, the chief now said Zelpa, not her husband, should be punished.

He ordered a pit dug for Zelpa’s pregnant belly. Zelpa, still in pain, cried as the pit was dug. Men, women and children gathered round as she was made to lower herself in. Then she was whipped with a leather lash across her buttocks 10 times. By the time it was over, she was raw and bleeding.

That night, Zelpa and her husband did not speak a word to each other. Zelpa wanted to leave, but her friends and her neighbours still urged her to stay. The child, a girl, was born two months later. Zelpa’s life might have continued along this brutal path if not for the fact in 2009 a local charity, the Mundri Relief and Dev- elopment Association (MRDA), started workshops, funded by the Scottish charity SCIAF, in her area as part of a pilot scheme tackling gender-based violence.

Zelpa and her husband attended one. It was all about how women have the right to live without fear of violence. For the women who attended, it opened their eyes to their own rights, but it also had a major impact on Mustafa. As soon as they got home, he apologised and asked for Zelpa’s forgiveness. He was not the only one. The village chief, who also attended the workshop, also apologised. Both men now accept what they did was wrong. No other woman has been “punished” on the chief’s orders and Mustafa has not raised a hand to her since. Two years on, the couple now understand the need for mutual respect, says Zelpa.

Violence towards women is endemic in South Sudan, a consequence of women’s long-standing status as second-class citizens. Matters have not been helped by 22 years of civil war, which ended in 2005. War was disastrous for women’s education and political empowerment; women’s literacy is thought to be below 10%.

On July 9, South Sudan will become an independent country and there are high hopes amongst the population for development. Changing deep-rooted discriminatory attitudes towards women will take time, perhaps generations. The work of the MRDA, however, is already having an extraordinary impact in terms of unlocking the power of local women to advocate for their own rights.

Regina Samson, MRDA’s gender violence project officer, explains that in Sudanese culture, women tend to hide their problems. “If you are beaten, you are not supposed to talk about it,” she says. “The culture is that women are not even supposed to be heard,” says Janet Obu, the programme manager. “They are suffering, but don’t know they can speak out.”

Women are socialised to cook and fetch water, like their mothers did, says Light Wilson Aganwa, executive director of MRDA. “As a girl, you are not instilled from childhood with the idea that you can do a job that a man is doing, or even that you could do it better. You are brought up in two camps – young girls and young boys. As a result, women are treated as having less ability, power and capacity for independence than men. We are encouraging young girls to change that mindset. Our aim is to liberate women so they say enough is enough.”

The workshops give the women licence to feel aggrieved – and that has finally given a voice to some extraordinarily courageous individuals. Joy Alwya, 41, is usually found on her homestead because she must cultivate crops alone, in order to feed her five girls and her boy. Her husband is a violent alcoholic and contributes nothing. He spends most of the day away from home and comes back drunk. He frequently attacks Joy and sometimes the children too. The last time was three days ago, when he knocked Joy down and kicked her in the kidneys. When we meet, she is still in pain. Joy fears that one day her husband might kill her, but says: “I can’t run away because of the children. If I leave the children here, they will suffer.”

Joy has a clear, unblinking gaze and talks of her ongoing ordeal with remarkable calm. She married when she was 13, she explains, and the violence started after she had had her second child, when her husband started drinking. The worst incident took place last year when he locked her and five of the children in a tukul (mud hut) and threatened to set fire to it. “Today is your day. I am not going to spare you. I am going to kill you and your children,” he shouted. Joy and the children were screaming; they could smell smoke as he tried to light the grass roof. They were only released when neighbours came running and broke down the door.

Joy’s husband attended an MRDA workshop in March, but it had a limited effect. It made him see his behaviour had been wrong, and since then the beatings have been less frequent, but they still continue. He does not listen to advice, says Joy; the drink turns him “upside down”. Until he gives that up, nothing will change.

However, Joy has taken heart from the workshops. “It is a place to be protected,” she says. At her workshop, they talked about women’s rights and she has shared those ideas with her daughters. She tells them that they must learn from their mother’s experience; she wants them to know that when they grow up, they can move away. If her husband is still beating her then, she will go with them.

Like Joy, Lois Batun has also found strength and solidarity with her daughters. She and her eight girls used to live comfortably in the town of Lui where her husband Grant ran a shop; they had a brick house and all the children went to school. But after Grant died, in 2006, her in-laws forced her and her daughters out, even though it had been Grant’s wish that they should stay and have the business.

Lois has found herself powerless to resist this injustice. She and her daughters now live far from the main road in ill-maintained tukuls that do not have proper doors. The family sometimes go two days without food. Now only some of the girls attend school. Through MRDA, Lois has received counselling to help her deal with her bouts of depression and she has come to challenge the ideas about women she was brought up with. “Women are even better,” she now says. She and her girls built her tukul – men are supposed to do that, she points out. Before, she felt it was her fault she had had only girls, but now, thanks to MRDA, knows about X chromosomes and Y chromosomes and believes it was God’s will. As well as providing counselling and education, MRDA also helps women start up income-generating activities. This work is only possible due to funding support from SCIAF, to the tune of £155,324.

Deborah Livingstone, Africa programme manager for SCIAF, says: “The consequences of war in South Sudan are still being felt, especially by women and children. Horrifying levels of sexual and gender-based violence including beatings, rape and disinheritance are commonplace.

“This is made worse by traditional patriarchal values that mean women are treated like second-class citizens and often don’t know they have basic human rights. South Sudan’s legal system is also massively under-resourced and unavailable to most women.

“SCIAF started working with MRDA to change the attitudes and practices of men, the community, the judiciary and policy-makers.”

Worryingly, a man found guilty of domestic violence could have his punishment reduced if he can show he has been provoked, such as with verbal insults. As for the police, says Aganwa, “they are not well trained and most are not literate; they don’t have any training in ethics”.

The unborn child Zelpa was carrying when she was whipped is now three years old. Her name is Afya, which means forgiveness, but alongside the forgiveness is a new sense of empowerment in Zelpa. To women who are attacked by their husbands, she has very clear advice: “You should report it,” she says. “You cannot just stay at home.”

She has been spreading this message among friends and neighbours and will bring her daughter up to understand that violence is not something women must endure.

To make a donation to SCIAF’s work in Sudan and around the world, visit www.sciaf.org.uk or call 0141 354 5555

AFRICA

CRY

AFRICA