6 Facts Reveal Through Sugabelly about Rape Scandal in Nigeria

 

If you've not read Sugabelly's story of Rape then you've not been on twitter, Nigerian twitter to be exact. Sugabelly is a talented artist (illustrator) and blogger at sugabellyrocks.com you should check out her drawings :) 

Although she has mentioned how Audu Abubakar's son's raped her in the past. Lately because of his passing the story was resurrected and it's a good thing it was brought up because it brings to light the many bad things happening in this Nigeria.
Shout out to Sugabelly for sharing her story, it takes a lot of courage. Read it HERE

1. VICTIM BLAMING: No matter the situation, the first thing people do is victim blaming which is the number one reason victims don't share their stories. It starts with " What were yo doing there?", why were you wearing a miniskirt", why didn't you have common sense to leave"...comments like that blame the victim and justifies the abuser. 

2. BADLY BEHAVED BOYS : Which i call #BBB. We make so much noise and spend too much time bringing up girls to be good mothers, awesome wives yet we don't do this for boys. Boys are sometime allowed to be "Boys" and we enable their behaving by saying things like "That's how men are". Bring up the boys to be decent men, men of good character and we will have less of all this yamayama behaviour. 

3. STIGMA: This is the cross a victim of rape has to bear and it is a heavy cross because they are told things like "Nobody will marry you if you let people know you have been raped". They are often classed as second class and many end up thinking they are not deserving of real love. This is really heartbreaking.

Those hateful comments in response to Sugabelly and her story tells you everything you need to know about rape culture in Nigeria

— Amara Nwankpa (@bubusn) November 27, 2015

4. RAPE HAPPENS MORE OFTEN THAN WE THINK: From stories shared it does make me believe that at least 1 girl in every family has the unfortunate experience of being raped. Don't think because you haven't heard stories it is not happening, it is. People just don't share because of the reason's stated above. They are often intimidated into silence.

If only you knew what your sisters, aunts, cousins and your closest female friends have been through and keep to themselves.

— Bubbles (@Asiiia__) November 27, 2015

5. TRUST NO ONE: More often than not Uncles, brothers, neighbours, cousins, house helps, gatemen, drivers are the one's doing most of this raping. It's mostly care givers and people we trust that seem to take advantage of the situation. Don't trust anybody with your child and as a parent always try to be invested in your childs life and trust your instinct.

6. NO JUSTICE: This is the most heartbreaking thing I learnt, rape victims hardly get justice especially as sometimes they are ridiculed and then asked to "prove" it happened which is hard to do. How many cases of rape have you seen justice for? Not many. This is perhaps the biggest reason why rape is still common.

Forget @sugabelly for a second. If a woman says she's been raped, probability is that she's been raped. And Nigeria doesn't handle rape well

— ST (@seyitaylor) November 23, 2015

To all the people who have experience rape, you are not a victim but a survivor, I applaud you all for sharing your stories.

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