Each
community that we visited was so beautifully distinct. Every village had its own personality, challenges, traditions, and accomplishments.
At each stop we were greeted with a traditional welcome and smiles which
could light up the night sky.
However, I want to begin by returning to the topic of violence against women (and in particular sorcery related violence) and sharing the stories of two women (Mama Rasta and Mori) who I was privileged to spend some time with yesterday.
While taking
part in the panel discussions about Sorcery Related Violence at the PNG Human
Rights Film Festival, I was struck by just deeply held the belief in sorcery still
is in PNG. Although sitting with an
audience which was, for the most part, sympathetic to human rights and well
educated, I couldn’t help but feel that even the most rational and logical
thinking is often by-passed when the discussion turns to sorcery.
We discussed
the fact that a lack of education and understanding of basic science doesn’t
help to assuage the almost immediate assumption that an unexplained illness or
death is sorcery related. We discussed
the Government’s reclassification of sorcery related killing as wilful murder,
and its reintroduction of the death penalty.
We discussed the evidential difficulties in ‘proving’ that a person has
been involved in black magic and how the legal justice system is ill-equipped
to deal with these sorts of cases. We
discussed the difficulties in engaging the police to investigate violence
against those accused of sorcery (either because the police agree with the
beliefs of the perpetrator, are prepared to accept a bribe to release the
perpetrator, or because they haven’t paid by the victim to investigate the case
in the first place). We discussed how
sorcery accusations were often used as a convenient way to remove a rival, to
payback a grievance, as part of a land dispute, or simply as jealousy led
vengeance. We discussed the fact that
many attacks are carried out by gangs of youths (possibly being dictated to behind
the scenes by an older or more powerful leader in some sort of mob-style hit).
However,
throughout all of those discussions the bottom line was that the belief in
sorcery is endemic within PNG society.
Moreover, it fuels such fear that the mere accusation is enough to
destroy a reputation and put that person in danger for the remainder of their
life. Personally, I am not a ‘religious’
or ‘spiritual’ person. I don’t buy into,
say, Christianity any more than I do witchcraft. I put them in the same box and equally have
no place for them in my life. But I know
many people who are religious and who would defend their faith to the hilt no
matter what I said about my perception of the rationality of those
beliefs. And that’s precisely the
point.
Religious beliefs are as much based on blind faith as sorcery is. It isn’t something that can be explained epistemologically, nor reasoned as being evidence based. However, it is something that people genuinely and wholeheartedly believe. For me the right to freedom of opinion and expression is as important as the right not to be subjected to violence. I wouldn’t criticise or reject a person’s right to believe in whatever they choose. However, where there is science based evidence which disproves a belief, that should be advanced and the belief challenged. Education is a major part of that. However, even where a rational or scientific explanation exists, sorcery will still often be cited as the cause of a death or illness and the purported sorcerer subjected to torture in order to force a confession and then brutally killed or punished. That is a just outcome as far as the accusers are concerned.
Those who are working within PNG to tackle Sorcery
Related Violence are some of the bravest women and men I have ever met in my life. I am constantly inspired by their commitment
to tackle the vicious, irrational, and senseless violence which usually follows
an accusation of sorcery. They are reaching and striving for a society in which women are not the butt of every male frustration. They have a vision of a world where women do not simply accept the role of punching bag or expect to be a recipient of sexual violence. They are continually questioning and trying to figure out just how the communities in which they live have been degraded to such an extent that brutal violence and sexual assault has been normalised.
They are also acutely aware of the daily risk that they are placed in when dealing with such cases. How protecting and standing up for the victim automatically puts them in the spotlight and significantly increases the chance of their becoming a victim of violence themselves. I cannot commend enough these incredible women nor praise their selfless pledge to continue fighting for the women that they are supporting. Most of these women are volunteers. They don’t benefit in any way from doing this work, but they are passionate about the need to do so.
The remainder of this post is dedicated simply to the sort of situations which these Human Rights Defenders are dealing with every day (my grateful thanks to Vlad Sokhin for allowing me to republish some of the incredible photographs from his ‘Crying Meri’ exhibition along with their accompanying captions). These stories are not unique in PNG. Only last week, for instance, a 5 year old girl was gang raped in at Gerehu, Stage 6, in Port Moresby after being kidnapped by the group of 5 men and 1 women. Violence, torture, brutal killings, sorcery accusations, and sexual attacks are daily occurrences for women in PNG. But the majority of these criminal abuses will go unreported and unchallenged. Those women instead will suffer in silence, just hoping to get through a week or even day without being attacked again.
So I want to thank those women who have stood up against this violence; who have shared their stories in the hope that others will not have to suffer as they have if they speak out. I also want to thank those women who put their own lives on the line every day to tackle these injustices, care for the victims, and challenge the perpetrators. They are all she-roes and voices of conscience for the people of PNG.
Vlad Sokhin
Mutilated hands of Rasta (around 60 years
old) who was accused of being a sorcerer by people from her village after the
death of a young man in 2003. During the
funeral, attended by all the villagers, the crowd surrounded Rasta and began to
beat her severely, strangling her with a rope and wielding axes, bush knives
and wooden sticks. Rasta managed to escape and ran into her house, where she
was caught by one of the attackers. He
tried to cut off Rasta’s head with a bush knife, but she managed to protect
herself with her arm, which was immediately chopped off. Rasta managed to survive that day, but had to
leave the village for good. Her husband
later received 600 kina from the village elders for the damage to his
wife. However, Rasta never received the
money given to her husband and had to seek help from her relatives in her home
village of Kudjip (Jiwaka Province), where she now lives.
I was thrilled
to meet up with Mama Rasta the day after she received her first prosthetic arm
– ten years after the attack. Her spirit
and spark is incredible given what she has been through.
Mori (not her real name) is around 24 years old. She has a 9 year old daughter Tara. When Tara was only a few months old Mori tried to divorce Tara’s father. While she was in the garden picking coffee Mori’s husband attacked her with a bush knife. He tried to cut off her head but missed, instead severing her arm and then slashing at her Achilles tendon.
Vlad Sokhin
Five months
pregnant, Doring (23) was brutally attacked by her husband and expelled from
her house early in the morning. Doring’s
drunken husband assaulted her, kicking her in the abdomen and repeatedly
striking her face against the wall.
During the ultrasound the doctors did not hear the heartbeat of the
unborn baby.
Melinda (13)
receiving treatment at the Port Moresby General Hospital after being raped by
her 43 year old stepfather, who burned her skin with a hot metal bar, forcing
his step-daughter to remove her clothing.
Melinda’s mother is afraid to report her husband to the police out of
fear of his revenge. Melinda is scared
to return home, but would have to do so to continue her schooling.
Vlad Sokhin
Richard (45)
shows the disfigured ear of his wife Agita (32) in the Morobe block of Mort
Moresby. In December 2010 after coming
home drunk Richard took a bush knife and cut off half Agita’s left ear. He spent one night in the police station and
was released the next morning due to ‘insufficient evidence’ to initiate
criminal proceedings. Agita’s relatives
did not allow her to leave Richard, having received 500kina compensation from
him for the ‘potential damage’.
Vlad Sohkin
A doctor of
the Antenatal Clinic in Port Moresby examines the genitals of 14 year old Freda
who was raped on 17 January 2012 by a 40 year old lawyer. Freda said the man was a friend of her family
so she didn’t suspect anything when he offered her a lift to the market. However, he instead drove Freda to his house,
raped her and then left her on the road of a settlement. Freda’s father brought his daughter to the
hospital but wasn’t sure whether he wanted to sue the rapist.
Vlad Sohkin
Banil (16)
came to the Antenatal Clinic of Port Moresby after having been sexually
assaulted by her ex-boyfriend. The day
after their separation, her former partner came to her parents’ house and
threateneding her with a knife, dragged Banil to a bush area. There he beat her and raped her. Banil’s father managed to find his daughter
laying unconscious on the ground and brought her to the hospital.
Vlad Sohkin
Helen (40),
mother of seven children. On 27 December
2011 she was attacked by a ‘cannibal’ near the Boroko police station, in
central Port Moresby. The attacker bit
off Helen’s lower lip and tried to sink his teeth into her throat. She managed to escape by kicking her
assailant in his testicles and biting three of his fingers, forcing him to
release her. Police arrested the man and
found that this was his third attempt to eat human flesh. After spending three days in the hospital,
Helen went to the Police Station in initiate criminal proceedings against the ‘cannibal’,
but discovered that he had been released due to lack of complainants. Helen is still waiting for the hospital’s
approval to start surgery for a skin graft on her missing lip.
Vlad Sohkin
A PNG man
(39) is waiting for his court trial in his prison cell, having been accused of
multiple rapes, Port Moresby, Boroko Police Station.
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