Australian to release film on how she was gang raped in Nairobi
An Australian woman who was violently robbed and gang raped in Nairobi in 2006 is set to release a film on her ordeal on Sunday.
In the film, Ms Charlotte Campbell-Stephen talks of her seven-year struggle to bring her attackers to justice.
The film, I Will Not Be Silenced, will premier during the launch of the 2015 Human Rights Arts and Film festival in Melbourne, Australia.
GO BACK HOME
Ms Campbell-Stephen says the Australian embassy in Nairobi advised her to go back home after police failed to help her quest for justice.
She was working for African Leaf, an organisation that supports abused children, when the attack happened. This was barely two months into her stay in Kenya.
Ms Campbell-Stephen says she was told rape victims rarely get justice in Kenya and that the crime was common in Kenya.
She says she was also told victims rarely report their attackers to police or testify against them in court.
But Ms Campbell-Stephen would not just put the matter to rest, not for her own sake but for the sake of thousands of the many women who suffered in silence.
RECEIVE SUPPORT
Makers of the documentary say they received support from the Kenyan judiciary. They say Chief Justice Willy Mutunga granted them access to Kenyan courts and were also allowed to film there.
Recently, Dr Mutunga screened the film to 400 magistrates and judges during a seminar in Nairobi and told Ms Campbell-Stephen: “This is all I need to change the system.”
This week, Ms Campbell-Stephen told UK-based Guardian newspaper ordeal took eight hours.
“That was a long time to stare at the gang as it mocked and raped me,” she said.
Even though the attackers were only convicted on two counts of violent robbery and not rape, she is happy she won the case. She hopes things will begin to change for rape victims in Kenya.
She is still in Kenya where she works with a woman’s empowerment organisation, Polycom Project.
“My time in Kenya is not up,” she told the Guardian. “I love working with women and seeing the change and possibilities that open to them when they learn about the power they hold.”
Source: Daily Nation