The Sunday News
TRADITION leads to silence in matters of rape. There is no urgency in reporting the matter except red tape. Sofia wants to tell her mother first instead of reporting the matter to the police. Having heard Sofia’s story, her mother decides that they inform her father first. In this case, Joseph Takundwa, Sofia’s father, is in league with Nyati, the rapist. He uses threats and blackmail to silence Sofia and her mother.
Remember Joseph Takundwa said he would hang himself that day if they went ahead and reported to the police. The final straw was when he told Sofia and her mother to take everything of theirs if they were going to the police, never come to his house again. Never enter his house again both of them. It is suffice to say Sofia underwent a traumatic experience after that rape by Nyati. Her father had shot down the idea of reporting to the police, she had a nightmare that night.
She saw herself dead and buried under a mass of raw sewage. The decaying sinews of her body were being torn to shreds by gigantic worms. Apparently, the worms had just finished eating both Tabitha and her mother. The worms were beginning to dig deeper into her dead heart with their giant canines that looked like bayonets. The giant worms opened their mouths and snarled at her. Their teeth were dripping with human blood, her young sister’s blood! That was Tabitha’s innocent blood.
These are the signs of a tormented mind, full of fearful dreams. Sofia had been defiled and deflowered by old man Nyati. Sofia lost her virginity through cruel means. On top of that, she had fallen pregnant. After three weeks she started feeling strange things. Sometimes without warning, she was seized by sudden sickness. She would rush to the toilet and vomit uncontrollably. All this confirmed her pregnancy.
Sofia had a myriad of questions running through her mind. If she was genuinely pregnant, what would the future hold for her? What type of a child would it be? What would people think of her? Most of all, what would her Jeremiah think of her? Throughout their affair she had not allowed Jeremiah even a single innocent kiss. Theirs was a far sighted affair. Both would have to finish their studies first. Sofia had always wanted to train as a teacher after passing her O-levels.
Jeremiah had higher ambitions. He had dreams about going to the university. He had both the brains and the confidence to achieve that. How then would she tell him that she was pregnant? Sofia receives no joy from her mother concerning the pregnancy. Her mother pretends not to know the person responsible for the pregnancy. Nyati made Sofia pregnant through rape not by consent, yet her mother says: “Whoever the father of that child is, you must let him know now before it is too late.”
Sofia is mad with her mother for saying such a thing. She tells her that she is carrying Nyati’s child. Her mother is not done yet as she advises her to tell Nyati before it is too late, otherwise he will disown the pregnancy and refuse to marry her as per tradition. Sofia is adamant that she would not marry Nyati. What shocks us as readers is the highest form of abuse exhibited by Sofia’s mother as she legitimises rape. She wants Sofia to marry Nyati because she is pregnant regardless of the circumstances which brought about that situation.
Sofia is forced into a loveless marriage. She makes it clear to her mother that she does not love Nyati and will never love him. She asks how she could marry a man she does not love. Sofia blames her mother for everything telling her that they should have reported Nyati to the police a long time ago. Sofia puts it plainly that Nyati deserves to go to jail for what he did to her. Her mother defends herself reminding Sofia that she knows exactly why they did not report the matter. We now know why they did not report the matter to the police, they were afraid of reprisals from Joseph Takundwa, Sofia’s father.
Joseph Takundwa threatened to kill himself and to kick them out of his home if they reported Nyati to the police. Sofia is furious to hear her mother utter such words. She threatens to kill herself if what her mother and her husband wanted. Nurses at the clinic confirmed Sofia’s fears of pregnancy. The nurses immediately warned her of the dangers of back street abortions. Many young girls had lost their lives because of such abortions.
Sofia was very upset as she says she understood the essence of hell. She then knew why people doused themselves with paraffin and set themselves alight. She did not understand why she deserved all that. She had once vowed that she would never fall pregnant before getting pregnant. A wise decision indeed. She used to think that only loose girls would fall pregnant. She had always taken pride in her virginity and strength, yet here she was, unmarried and pregnant. All her dreams were shattered.
However, the writer deserves credit for showing us the expectations of society through what Sofia had earlier on vowed to do. He strikes the right chord again when he warns against the dangers of back street abortions through the knowledge given to Sofia by nurses at a local clinic. Sofia also seems to have come out wiser from that situation this far. She tried to look into her future. There was no light at the end of the tunnel. The options were all blunt.
“Tell Nyati about this pregnancy and be prepared to be wife number eight. Attempt a back street abortion and probably die in the process. I could just decide to be a single mother. Maybe Jeremiah would understand and marry me later on. After all there were a lot of girls whom I had gone to school with, who were single mothers now. But then who would maintain the child?” Sofia remains optimistic that she might be lucky and find another job, a more straight forward job without strings attached to them.
She now understood that jobs could have a high price rag attached to them. That pregnancy had been the heavy price that she had paid for one.
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