what is wrong with the BN government’s reluctance to release the report and to make the Sarawak government take action is because the former is propped up by the latter. At the last GE, if Sarawak and Sabah had not won the number of seats they did the current government would have been standing on wobbly legs. It’s all about staying in power with the Federal govt., and all about making money at the expense of the Penans and other Dayaks in Sarawak.
Malaysia’s other state – on economy, poverty alleviation, healthcare – grew at the rate crimes against women are climbing up in this country make space for the large number of women, perhaps larger than the ones reporting their violation, who keep quiet and bury their shame forever in their hearts for fear of another round of abuse, this time from family, society, police.
Such barbarism in a country that dreams to be a developed nation and demands every seat at every global high table should indeed be humiliating not only for its leaders but also its people. But few are moved by the plight LUST IN RETURN FOR RIDES IN PENAN COUNTRY , still living in such dread, such suffocating coexistence. And this in 2009 – the 21st century.
Where do the perpetrators get such courage and confidence from that they stop a running bus, pull out a woman and leave her by the roadside after raping her, that they trap a foreign diplomat and rape her in a car, that they catch hold of a college student and violate her atop a building even as heavy traffic passes by a few feet below? How is it that a cop instead of protecting a young girl shuts her inside a police post and does the unthinkable?
The arrogance mostly comes from a knowledge that in a society like sarawak the victims will be silenced “naturally and culturally”. It comes from the deadly and deeply ingrained dynamics of a feudal nation that treats women as second class citizens. And it comes from hundreds of years of brainwashing of the male mind after Manu said women were little better than cattle. Importantly, it derives an insidious power of its own by the silent suffering of women themselves, by their own reluctance to fight for the space they rightly deserve and are perpetually denied.
Top police officers say the number of rape cases reported among the Penansgirls may not even be a fraction of the one that’s actually committed. Social activists echo this. For every Penan woman who reports her violation, there are 10 who will not speak up. Somehow, the sarawak male – and a predominantly male-dominated police and administration – continues to put the onus of the crime, rather incredibly, on the victims: you must have sent some signal; you must have been dolled-up and dressed provocatively; maybe you are crying rape because you have been caught; why did you have to answer nature’s call when you know there could be thugs lurking around; what shame you have brought on us; why you.
This is enough to kill the spirit of most women and for those that can transcend this psychological brutality there is the crude questioning by cops and lawyers, something many victims say is like going through a second rape. Not surprising that they prefer to seal their lips and kill their sense of dignity and honour. And we are not even talking about the numerous others subjected to molestation, groping, eve teasing and degrees of verbal and physical abuse – at the movie hall, in the bus, in crowded bylanes, markets, trains, almost everywhere. In any case, the stares you get after that is almost, like, killing. If you are a working woman not rich enough to take your own car to office, groping is a routine reality.”
A group of informed citizens have started a cyber campaign against rape, clamoring for stricter laws, including death sentence if it involves minors and handicapped. It’s already got robust support and, clearly, many think it’s a step in the right direction. The courts will have to get stringent – many still persuade the rapist to marry his victim – but there is urgent need for another three-pronged effort. One, investigating agencies will have to be sensitized on how to deal with such cases. Two, society at large will have to change its attitude towards victims and make the leap from judgemental censure to empathy. Finally, women themselves will have to fight their demons and come out in the open about their various abuses.
Logging tracks are the only means of access to their villages. Their schools and clinics are four to five hours away.
They were young Penan girls who depended on timber vehicles to take them to these places.
But along the way, the drivers detour and the girls get molested and raped.
There were, initially, denials and doubts that such incidents occur in the Penan heartland of Ulu Baram in northern Sarawak.
However, an in-depth investigation by the Women, Family and Community Development Ministry found that the assaults did take place and victims were always caught in a defenseless situation.
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