An Update on the ABSU Rape

Apparently the victim of the ABSU rape case has been found and is receiving some sort of counseling or therapy.

This is no doubt utterly wonderful news. I hope that she will benefit immensely from therapy and will heal her psychological wounds.

Also, the police who initially joined the Abia state government to deny the veracity of the case are now investigating after being ordered to do so by the National Assembly. Also good news.

As far as not so good news goes, a few online news outlets are still reporting the full names that Baba Jide Salu posted in this post as rapists or rape suspects even though they have received emails stating otherwise and in spite of the fact that as we now know, the information from Baba Jide Salu's blog post was wrong. I originally tweeted this blog post but hopefully most of you have seen my tweets saying that this information is incorrect since I found out that the information in his post was wrong.

I emailed Baba Jide Salu asking him to take down his posts since in spite of efforts to correct the spread of wrong information and emails to sites who were hosting articles about it, more news sites (such as Sahara Reporters) continued to quote his posts and contribute to the spread of wrong information.

At first he replied me and refused to take them down but as of yesterday evening it appears he has had a change of heart and has now password protected these posts and stated that he is no longer blogging about the case for personal reasons.

The police have also made some arrests regarding the case and from what some online news articles are saying, they arrested some of the people mentioned online/on Twitter. I have mixed feelings about this. While it is good that the police is now working on the case, I don't think that as police (as opposed to regular members of society) they should just arrest people based off what they saw on the Internet. At the very most, the information posted on the Internet should be considered as leads to the police so they should question such people to find out if they have or know any information that may be pertinent to the case, but from what little I understand about police procedure, arrests are only supposed made when there is some sort of supporting on-ground evidence that a person/suspect is tied to a case.

That being said, I think the single most important factor is that the victim has been found. This is significant because since the rape was not of the sudden, quick variety, but rather went on for a prolonged period of time, the victim had more than enough time to study the faces of her attackers and should be able to (when she is ready) point out to the police directly who did or did not attack her.

If you have been following the case and would like to read further on it, the following bloggers have good posts concerning the ABSU rape case:

Black Looks - Tabloid Bloggers Online Vigilantes and Sexual Violence

Ginger - What Rape Culture Looks Like

Looking Glass of an Immigrant - Enough is Enough, Time to Cut at the Roots of Violence Against Women and Should We also Not be Scared to Blame Rape Victims?

Bella Naija - The Real Shame of Rape and A Country United Against a Common Enemy? Discussions on the ABSU Rape Continue

Bob-Ij - No Means No: Real Men Don't Rape

Aloofar - With love from my toto

Lady Ngo - Hope

Stuff Nigerians Love/Hate - The Nigerian Governor's Guide to Handling Rape Cases

Naija Lines - On Rape and Fish Them Out Now

Inyanmu's El Dorado - Please Don't Blame Me

Half and Half - The Trouble with Technology

and many more...

OkShorty in this post is offering a reward for information about the case. Though the victim has been identified and arrests have been made, the case is not over. Those arrested might not necessarily be guilty or the actual perpetrators and at least two of the perpetrators are still out there. Healing from rape is a delicate thing and chances are it will take a while. If in the mean time you have any information that might be of help, please inform the police and also let OkShorty and other involved NGOs like Enough is Enough Nigeria know too.

There is also a March/Walk against Rape and Violence against Women on October 5 in Lagos (Abia State Liason Office), Abuja (Eagle Square) and of course, Abia (Okpara Square) organised by Enough is Enough (EIE) Nigeria, Project Alert and a number of other organisations.

If you are able to attend the walks please go and show your support for the ABSU victim as well as victims of rape everywhere, reported, and especially unreported.

Thank you to everyone who helped to get the authorities to listen and to do something. Thank you to everyone who tweeted and blogged and wrote about it. But most of all thank you to all the individuals and NGOs on ground in Nigeria who worked and are still working tirelessly to assist the victim and the police and to get national attention for this case so that it would not continue to be ignored. I think that as Nigerians we came together to help another Nigerian who was downtrodden so maybe as a country we're not so bad after all.

Change.org has a petition with over 73,000 signatures (at last count) for the ABSU case so if you're inclined, please sign it .

According to Sugabelly.