A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to interview Julien, a 30-year-old survivor of an abusive relationship.  I have deliberately chosen to use her story as my last substantial blog post, for two reasons.  First, because it is the most direct profile that I have been able to put together.  I have interviewed several professionals that work with victims and survivors of domestic violence, and two people who lost loved ones to domestic abuse, but Julien is the only person I have interviewed who actually went through the abuse herself.  And more importantly, because I think it is the most hopeful interview I have done.  I think it’s almost miraculous that the person who has had the most direct experience with domestic violence is also the most hopeful and positive about not only her future, but the future of all those who suffer this kind of violence.

Julien was married in her early twenties.  Unbeknownst to her, her new husband was already married, and had never divorced his first wife.  He started abusing her when she found out that their marriage was not actually legal (polygamy is illegal in Namibia, despite the fact that some tribes practice it traditionally).  He beats her and often threatens to kill her.  He has a gun which he sometimes points at her.  He does all this in front of their two sons, who are only 4 and 5 years old.  In this video, Julien tells us about one instance in which he used the gun to frighten her:

She told me this story before I actually video-taped her, and she started giggling a little bit when she told me that after he brandished the gun at her by the side of the car, she started running, and he couldn’t catch up because he is “a little bit fat,” in her words.  I think that’s why she smiles when telling this part of the story in the video.  I loved that she could still laugh, could still find things funny, even while telling me this horrifying tale. She has an undeniable joie de vivre and enjoyment in life.  Talking with her, I found myself filled with admiration for her bravery, and also anger that someone would try to repress her joyful spirit the way her husband did.

I got to interview her because she took her kids, left her husband and her home, and came to Windhoek to find help.  She is working with Rosa Namises (I profiled Rosa in a previous blog post) who is helping her to find a safe place to live and work through the legal side of things.  Julien has taken out a protection order with the police, and as she put it, knocking on every door that could possibly help her, because ultimately, she does believe that her husband will eventually try to kill her.  She was not at all shy about being photographed and video-taped, and immediately gave me permission to use her name, because:

If there are women out there and they are are scared what their husbands are gonna do to them, if we don’t speak out no one is gonna hear us and know how we are suffering.  So really I’m willing to take a stand and make a change.  I might impact somebody else’s life, some other lady who cannot speak out.  So I’m willing to go that route.

After I was done asking all my questions, I asked her if there was anything else she wanted to say.  She thought for a minute and then said this:

I am so grateful that I got to meet Julien.  She reminds me that even after undergoing trauma, women can change their own lives for the better, and that they can even emerge with their spirits intact.

Erastus Nekuta agreed to be interviewed about his niece, Selma Shaimemanya, who was shot and killed by her abusive husband, Lazarus Shaduka, on July 13, 2008.  Erastus described Selma as “…always available to help where help was needed.”  He also said that she was hard-working and forward-looking, and that she was “trying to be somebody in life.”  She was well-educated: she attended university at the Polytechnic in Windhoek and then went to the UK to get her master’s degree.  When she came back to Namibia, she began working for the Ministry of Defense.  Soon after her return she married Shaduka.

Shaduka started abusing her immediately after the marriage and the situation deteriorated quickly.  He often threatened to kill her. Despite intervention by various family members, the abuse did not stop.  At one point, after he had threatened her with his gun, she went to the police to get a protection order.  However, she was pressured to withdraw her application by Shaduka’s family, and so she did not go through with the order.  The police confiscated his gun when she took out the order but he was able to retrieve it immediately after the case was withdrawn.  Soon after that, just one year after the wedding, he killed her with it, shooting her in the presence of their 8-month-old daughter.  Selma was just 33.  In this video Erastus describes her murder and what happened immediately afterward.

Shaduka is still waiting for trial.

Part of what Pauline is working on here in her capacity as the lead activist on issues of gun violence in Namibian civil society is altering the legal landscape to make guns less accessible.  There is one major law that regards gun ownership, the Arms and Ammunition Act of 1996.  This law states that a person must be 18 to own a firearm, must apply for a license for each weapon and register it with the police, and must have a “strong-room” or safe in which to store it.  The law also allows for each citizen to own up to four guns.*

The Act provides for “declarations of unfitness” by police on grounds that the applicant is homicidal or suicidal, mentally unstable, “inclined to violence,” addicted to drugs or alcohol, or handles weapons “in a reckless manner.”  A person can be found unfit if he commits certain crimes without a firearm, such as murder, rape, assault, or robbery, but a court may find otherwise.  If a person is found to be unfit, his application for a firearms license can be declined, or a weapon in his possession can be taken away.

In 2003, Namibia enacted the Combating of Domestic Violence Act, which defines domestic violence (before 2003 not recognized as a separate crime in Namibia), provides for protection orders to be issued to victims, and outlines police responsibilities in responding to such crimes.  The law amends the Arms and Ammunition Act by including domestic violence as a crime that can render an offender unfit to own weapons.  In addition, the CDV Act allows for police seizure of weapons at the scene under section 23:

“Any police officer who reasonably suspects that a domestic violence offence has been committed may -(a)  question any person present at the scene of the offence to determine whether there are weapons at the scene; and (b) on observing or learning that a weapon is present at the scene, search any person, premises, vehicle or other place and seize any weapon that the officer reasonably believes would expose the complainant to a risk of serious bodily injury.”  [italics mine]

Notice that “may.”  This is not a requirement, but an option, for police officers.

Pauline’s goal is to make the link between the two laws stronger; for example, to have the Arms and Ammunition Act require that weapons be taken not only from convicted abusers, but those with a protection order against them, and to require that police consult with family members before granting licenses.  She is also working to raise the legal age of gun ownership to 21, to institute a competency test for gun ownership, and to ban the carrying of weapons in public places by civilians.  She is hoping that progress will be made this year.  Some Namibian Parliamentarians have publically expressed support for amending the law to include these changes, among others.  Meanwhile, lobbyists for gun dealers and hunting groups are taking every chance they can get to bend parliamentarians’ ears.

*A note on the four-gun allowance: This policy has been defended as vital to a country of farmers and hunters. In his report for the Institute for Public Policy Research in Windhoek, “In Self-Defense: Firearms Usage in Namibia,” researcher Martin Boer quotes security consultant Colonel Radmore as saying, “Namibia is a gun country.  A farmer will have at least two rifles or a shotgun and a rifle.  He needs them to hunt, he needs them to feed his people.”  But as Boer’s report reveals, the vast majority of applications for firearms licenses show the stated reason for the application as self-defense.  Moreover, most applicants are located in urban centers and are requesting licenses for pistols or revolvers, not the rifles or shotguns that would normally be used for hunting.[1]

Today I spoke with a woman aptly named Memory.  She agreed to tell me about her cousin Rudolfine, who was shot and killed by her boyfriend in September 2004.  Rudolfine was only 24 and had a 9-year-old daughter who is now without a mother.

Rudolfine’s boyfriend was a member of the Namibian Defense Force (the Namibian military), which is how he had obtained the gun that killed Rudolfine.  Her family does not know whether he abused her previously, or whether he had ever threatened her with the gun.  All they know is that one day the couple had an argument.  The boyfriend left the house briefly, came back with the gun, and shot and killed Rudolfine.  He then shot himself, but he survived.

Rudolfine’s killer was taken into custody later but Memory did not know whether he had been convicted or even on trial.  She said that the family had chosen not to follow what happened to him.  When I asked her about the relationship between her and Rudolfine, she said that they had actually only met a few years before her death, “so it was such a short time and it was really bad losing her.”

When I looked up Rudolfine’s death online to see if any news stories had been written about it, I found just one very short item, apparently without follow-up, in The Namibian.  Discussing the suspected murderer, its closing line reads: “The reasons for his actions are not yet known.”  I doubt they will ever be known, or can ever be comprehended.

I sat down with Pauline Dempers, National Coordinator and co-founder of Breaking the Wall of Silence (BWS), and asked her about the history and mission of the organization, how BWS became involved in combating gun violence, the challenges BWS is currently facing, and her vision for the future of the organization.

A little historical background will be helpful in understanding BWS’s roots and Pauline’s experience. During Namibia’s struggle for independence from South Africa, which was ongoing from the 1960s through the 1980s until independence was finally achieved in 1990, many Namibians left the country in order to train and fight in the struggle.  The South West Africa People’s Organization (SWAPO) was the leading voice of the liberation movement, and it was training soldiers and leaders in camps in Angola, Zambia, Tanzania, and Zimbabwe.  Starting in the 60s, tension developed between the older leadership of SWAPO and young people coming from Namibia.  In the 80s, the SWAPO leadership became convinced that there were spies for the South African government among the new arrivals.  They began jailing and torturing suspects in underground prisons.  No one knows how many people were imprisoned overall, but the number is somewhere between 1000 and 2000.  Many did not return.

In 1989, as part of the UN agreement that ended hostilities between South Africa and Namibia and granted independence to the new nation, surviving prisoners of war were repatriated to their respective countries.  Just 169 men, women and children were repatriated to Namibia from dungeons in Lubango, Angola.  The whereabouts of the rest of the detainees remains unknown.  Breaking the Wall of Silence was formed in 1996 by the survivors of the spy crisis to advocate for the human rights of the ex-detainees and their families.  SWAPO was elected as the ruling party after independence and remains the ruling party after 19 years.

The rest is best said in Pauline’s own words:

For more information on the mission and programs of BWS, please go to the new website at: http://sites.google.com/site/breakingthewallofsilence/Home