STELLA

Stella is fourteen years old. She is in the seventh grade at St. Luke’s Primary School, which is about two kilometers from THE GIRL CHILD EMPOWERMENT VILLAGE where she lives.

Before she came to the village, she had been staying with her father, mother, and younger sister. First her mother died, then her father. Stella and her sister were left with a stepmother who soon abandoned them: One day when Stella came home from school the home was deserted. Everything had been taken from the house, and their stepmother was gone. There was no food left behind. Even their clothes were gone. Stella was seven years old. Her sister was five.

The girls stayed in the house and took turns going to school. They had no money to pay for rent so the municipality soon repossessed the house. The girls moved to a field near a farm and built a little hut out of plastic for the two of them to live in. One day they arrived “home” to find that the hut had been destroyed—it was dubbed an illegal dwelling so local officials had simply flattened it. They had nowhere to go. A relative offered to take in her little sister, but Stella was left on her own.

She built a very small shelter using plastic trash she found lying around. She scrounged for food and slept on the ground under her plastic sheets. Despite her hardships, she continued to go to school. When she confided to a school counselor that she was living alone in a makeshift plastic shelter, she was offered a place to live at the Girl Child Empowerment Village.

At the village, it was discovered that Stella had been repeatedly raped. Living alone in her plastic hut, she had been visited by anonymous men who would force her to have sex. She did not understand what was happening to her and was powerless to fight back.

Stella has serious health issues such as headaches and stomach cramps. At night she often wakes up because her nose is bleeding and she cannot breathe. Though she is often hungry, she is afraid to eat because of the pain it might cause her stomach. Her legs give her a great deal of trouble—especially the right one—and she suffers from frequent skin rashes. She is currently being tested for AIDS.

EVA
Eva was twelve when she fell in love with a man of twenty. They started sleeping together and she became pregnant. The father of her child abandoned her because he feared he would be punished (it is illegal to impregnate a girl younger than fifteen). However, without his protection, Eva was helpless. Her parents chased her away from their home, telling her that she needed to go to the father’s home. When she arrived at his house, his parents chased her away.

Her aunt brought her to the empowerment village, where she now lives. She has since learned that her baby’s father has impregnated another under-age girl and is being sought by the authorities.

Runyararo

Three-year-old Runyararo was raped at the age of two. Although no one knows the full extent of what was done to her, she does have serious vaginal ulcerations. She was found asleep on a bench at a bus station in Rusape, apparently abandoned. A vendor at the bus station took her to the police, and the police in turn took her to the hospital where it was discovered that she was a victim of sexual assault.

Runyararo is living at the GCN. She has developed a bad skin rash and has trouble sleeping. She, too, will be tested for AIDS.

EMMA
Emma experienced several attempted rapes. One of the local and respected traditional healers would wait for her outside the school and try to take her back to the his house for “treatment.” He once coaxed her into his house and told her that he would give her strong medicine to make her smarter in school and stronger on the athletic field. All she had to do was lift her dress up to her shoulders. She did this, but when she saw that he then began to unzip his trousers she ran away. Her teacher would ask her why she ran home every afternoon, but she did not feel safe enough to tell. The healer was a well-respected member of the community, and she was just a girl.

One day, she stayed later than usual at school and the healer caught her on her road home. He fondled her face and told her how pretty she was, but Emma managed to wrench herself away and run back to school, where she finally told her teacher that she was terrified that the healer would force her to have sex. Even through her fear of both the healer and her own parents—who she believed would beat her for making trouble—Emma told her story. Her teacher told the headmaster, and the headmaster called a meeting of all the parents so he could explain how to stop the victimization of their children. After that meeting, the healer was arrested.

LUCIA

Lucia is sixteen years old and unable to speak. In African culture she is said to be dumb, but Lucia was not born with an ability to speak. When she was in second grade, at about six years old, she contracted a virulent case of malaria. Because her family could not afford to take her to a hospital, her condition deteriorated rapidly. They took her instead to a traditional healer, after which Lucia was once again able to hear, but her ability to speak never returned.

Schools would not accept the little girl who could not speak so she stayed at home. When her parents died, she was referred to a deaf organization, but when they examined Lucia they found nothing wrong with her hearing or her vocal chords. She did not fit there. When she learned of the Girl Child Network she decided to travel the twenty kilometers (12.5 miles) it took to get there, walking all the way. She had finally found a place she belonged.