A Congolese woman who has suffered sexual abuse in her home country but was refused asylum in South Africa, will turn to court.
A Congolese woman’s harrowing tale of sexual violence at the hands of soldiers in her country, followed by more sexual exploitation as she fled to South Africa, only to be refused asylum because her ordeal was not believed, could lead to a more gender-sensitive asylum system.
The Initiative for Strategic Litigation in Africa (ISLA) and Lawyers for Human Rights (LHR) approached the Gauteng High Court, Pretoria, in the matter of the woman from South Kivu who survived sustained sexual violence at the hands of armed forces in the DRC. She then survived it again, at the hands of border officials, in various countries as she fled.
She came to South Africa seeking protection. The asylum system deemed her not credible.
The region from which she fled has been continuously devastated by armed conflict and the systematic use of sexual violence against civilians for more than thirty years.
