27 January 2024: Demonstration in Nairobi against the rise of femicide. (Photo: Mwivanda Gloria / shutterstock.com)

Fear born out of femicide

by Bosibori Osusu • 14 March 2024

Living in fear is the worst experience anyone has to go through. It can be fear of the unknown or the known, but either way fear can be crippling and inhibit a lot of progress in someone’s life. Living in a neighborhood, town or city where you feel unsafe can be very challenging. The fear of a lot of things such as being robbed, kidnapped, raped and even murdered can be intense, especially since what everyone wants is a safe environment to grow physically, mentally and even emotionally.

As a parent, you do your best to protect and keep your children safe, but once they leave the nest, you hope and pray that they can take care of themselves, out in this cruel world. The year 2024 started on a very dark note in Nairobi city, Kenya. “I woke up one day and social media and the news channels were all about the murder of Scarlet. Two weeks later it was Rita”, said Genevieve^*. “When you hear something like that has happened to a woman like you, of course you get scared, but another one in just two weeks? The fear intensified for me,” she continued.

Two young women were brutally murdered in a span of two weeks. These two incidents sparked a lot of fear in women, since they felt that women were being specifically targeted. More cases were reported before the end of February. There have been such cases reported in the past but the intervals at which the cases of 2024 happened, and also the manner in which they happened, was deeply alarming.

The manner in which the women were murdered created more fear in women all over the country, especially as a gruesome photo was shared around on social media. This fear intensified as demonstrations were organized as a cry from women for their safety.¹ Unfortunately, these incidents did not lack speculations that these women brought these upon themselves, either by disrespecting the men or just by putting themselves in a position for something like that to happen to them. A number of advocates such as Irungu Houghton, who is the executive director of Amnesty International Kenya, have expressed concerns about what they believe is rampant toxic masculinity and misogyny in social media and other tabloids which suggest that these women were killed because they disrespected the men or were simply immoral².

One day I sat in an uber and as I was having a conversation with the driver, the femicide topic came up. We did have a lengthy conversation about it, but what really shocked me was what he said about these women. He blatantly stated that they did deserve to die. He feels no mercy for them. According to him, they were after money and they didn’t care who they followed to get it, hence putting themselves in danger. I only had one last question for him, what if it was your sister, daughter or cousin? Would you still feel the same way you do now? Of course, he had no answer for me.

“Walking on the streets alone, going to entertainment joints and even meeting new people has become a huge challenge for me. We are not safe even in transport vehicles such as uber, bolt, taxis and matatus,” said Monica^*. I used to feel very safe and confident, but now all I feel is fear, even in my own house. I no longer go out as I used to simply because, I do not want to be a victim, a statistic for that matter,” she continued. Statistics have shown that most gender-based violence crimes were committed by people known to the victims. But these current cases were committed by unknown assailants. Somehow that makes the fear so much more intense.

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Notes:

1 See e.g. https://www.unwomen.org/en/news-stories/feature-story/2024/02/femicide-cases-in-kenya-fuel-urgent-calls-for-action-to-end-violence-against-women, https://www.voanews.com/a/thousands-march-against-slayings-of-women-in-kenya/7459859.html  back

2 See e.g. https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2024/02/16/1231973412/murders-of-women-lead-to-a-call-for-a-law-on-femicide  back

* The names of Genevieve and Monica have been changed.

About the author:
Bosibori Osusu is a Kenyan Journalist. She lives and works in Nairobi, the capital city of Kenya.

About the image:
Photo by Mwivanda Gloria. Used under license from Shutterstock. shutterstock.com Stock Photo ID: 2428864637.

Suggested citation:
Bosibori Osusu: Fear born out of femicide. MissionField News (ISSN 2813-2270)
https://missionfield.news/2024/6_Femicide 2024-03-14.