Political violence scars women

While men have been the high profile targets of Zimbabwe’s political violence, concern is beginning to emerge that women may have been its hidden victims.

Young men have been at the forefront of political activism in the run-up to this weekend's presidential election. As a consequence, "it is quite noticeable that in the past six weeks there have been far more injured men that have made it to our offices", said Francis Lovemore of the Amani Trust, which specialises in the rehabilitation of torture victims.

"Women are not coming forward, especially where rape is concerned," she said. Poverty, fear and shame may be behind the reluctance of women from the rural areas, where much of the violence has taken place, to report their experiences.

"It’s only after [the election] that we will start investigating further and we’ll see how many people have been affected," Lovemore said.

But already there is evidence that rape has been deliberately used as part of the "torture process" against women, allegedly by pro-government militia, the Amani Trust said.

One aspect has been the use of public rape against perceived political opponents. Lovemore said five women had come forward since January to report that they were forced to have sex in front of witnesses at militia bases in Muzarabani and Murehwa, north of the capital Harare. They all contracted sexually transmitted diseases, she added.

There has also been a case of two men who were coerced into sexual acts, Lovemore noted, as part of the same political terror. The Amani Trust has helped a total of 300 victims of violence since January.

The opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), which is giving President Robert Mugabe's ruling ZANU-PF party its strongest challenge yet, claims that about 100 of its supporters have been killed in the run-up to the election.

According to Nancy Kachingwe of the NGO network Mwengo, it is not only the physical impact of Zimbabwe’s political violence that has affected women. Lack of access for civil society to rural communities across much of Zimbabwe has hurt empowerment programmes.

"The women's movement has been at a loss to respond to the situation," Kachingwe said. "In the past voter education was directed at women. Now, grassroots fieldworkers can't operate in some constituencies."

Zimbabwe's opposition movement was to an extent kicked off by a woman – Margaret Dongo, who as an independent won a seat in Harare in 1995. But the climate of political violence has tended to rob women of a high profile role in the current campaign.

"The situation continues to relegate us to cheerleaders, spectators and victims in this entire process," Kachingwe observed.