Sudanese women hope new government ends flogging, violence

Khartoum, Nov 25 (AFP/APP): Nine years after a Sudanese judge oversaw her flogging, Halima Abdalla remains broken and bitter, accusing even her family of rejecting her when it mattered most.

“Flogging breaks you from inside,” said Abdalla, 41, her voice choking and tears rolling down her cheeks as she narrated an ordeal that remains forensically imprinted on her mind.

“Since that incident, I have become violent myself… I get angry easily and I break things… all these changes in me happened because I’m a victim of violence.”

Nearly a year after a nationwide protest movement erupted against autocrat Omar al-Bashir — and more than seven months since his three-decade tenure was terminated by the army — women like Abdalla dare to hope for a violence-free future.

Abdalla, who holds a master’s degree in gender studies, says she received more than 100 lashes after Bashir’s security forces snatched her at night from outside her friend’s apartment in Khartoum in 2010.

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She was charged under Sudan’s controversial public order law for drinking alcohol, which is banned in the northeast African country.

Under Bashir, authorities implemented a strict moral code that activists note primarily targeted women, using harsh interpretations of Islamic sharia law.

Abdalla, who prefered not to reveal her real name, initially thought she would be punished with 40 lashes for her offence.

But she was in for a shock.

The judge — provoked by her confident demeanour, cropped hair and Western clothes — ordered 100 lashes, she said, adding that he insisted every stroke that was not audible be repeated.

“In my case, the judge was determined to see the flogging,” Abdalla said, wiping tears from behind her spectacles.

International Day for Elimination of Violence against Women to be marked tomorrow