They were ”mannerless boys” for whom rape was a sport after a day on the army firing range and who perhaps never imagined their alleged deeds would come to light.
But now, their victims — Kenyan Maasai and Samburu women who claim they were raped by British troops training in east Africa — are emerging from anonymity to tell of their ordeal.
Hundreds of women have been arriving at the Impact Centre, a community-based initiative in this dusty town 300 kilometres north of Nairobi, to register claims against the British defence ministry for the harm they suffered at the hands of British troops training in the area.
Kanawa Lenkaidura (55) said women were ”stripped naked and raped by mannerless boys of our sons’ age, without respect of motherhood.”
For years the women suffered in silence. They were afraid to tell their husbands. And some smothered the mixed-race infants to whom they gave birth.
And then they heard of Martyn Day, a British lawyer seeking compensation from the British defence ministry on behalf of local herders killed by unexploded munitions left behind on the British live-firing range.
The women asked him to look into their case as well. As a result, he said this week that he has claims from about 650 women.
Although some may be in it for the money, Day says he has solid evidence that many of their stories are genuine.
”I vividly remember the incident,” Lenkaidura, visibly shaking, said of the time she was assaulted.
”It was in 1984 when my daughter implored me to accompany her to the forest to graze goats,” she said.
”At around 10 am, two very young boys emerged from the undergrowth and started addressing me in a language that I had never heard. In a split second they grabbed me and tore my clothes off and started doing it, pressing harder and harder. I started screaming, but one of them crammed sour leaves into my mouth.”
Lendaikura added, ”The most embarrassing thing was raping me in full sight of my daughter.”
After the attack, she said, the soldiers ”fled laughing.”
Day alleges that some 2 000 troops had been involved in systematic rape ”ambushes” stretching back to 1977. The troops included Ghurka soldiers from Nepal.
Day says he has evidence to suggest that officers knew of several of the attacks. He is suing the defence ministry for up to 30 000 pounds in civil damages for each victim.
Most of the women are now in their 50s, but they say the memories have never left them.
Reni ole Meshami remembers that four soldiers brandishing rifles and bayonets emerged from the scrub at midday and asked where they could get a drink.
She said she was taking them to where they could get alcohol when ”as we walked, the next thing I realised was that I was being raped. I made a lot of noise, but that seemed to send the other women scampering away.”
Nayook ole Mositany said she was only 18 when she was raped by three soldiers.
”They did not say a word,” she said. Then they gave her a packet of crackers. – Sapa-AFP