An Ex Pastor’s Deceiving Plan to Rape Me

It was like dejavu. The further she read, the nightmare came flooding back.

It was just like her own experience.

The rape victim she read about reminded her of herself 16 years ago.

After reading Fiji Sun’s Shine a Light investigative project series about rape victims published last month, this young mother was determined to tell her story.

In fact, her husband encouraged her to do so.

They’ve agreed that the more she shared her experience and testimony, the stronger she would become.

She was victimised by family members and members of the church she attended.

With the support of her husband, she told of how she was raped when she was just 17 years old by someone she considered an elder

brother.

Here is her story:

I am now a 36-year-old mother of six, and the trauma I faced when I was 17 years old still haunts me today.

I was 15 years old, in the year 1999, when a pastor was posted to an island in Vanua Levu.

Pastors, who were posted to our island, had accommodation, but this particular pastor would frequent our home to eat or just for a visit.

We grew fond of having him around our home for two years, while he was serving on the island.

My parents considered him a member of our household. I was the eldest, and my siblings and I were delighted to have someone who we could look up to as a brother.

He was above the age of 30.

My father was the church leader on our island, and that’s one reason my parents were always pleased to serve pastors.

They believed that blessings would be poured out to the family, especially us children in the form of good education, jobs and a good future.

There came a time when he fell in love with my aunty, who was teaching at our village school. And because my father considered him family, he arranged for their marriage.

They got married in Suva in 2001, after they were both transferred to Viti Levu.

My family was happy to now have him as a real family member.

I didn’t know my beauty and weaving skills at a very young age was noticed, admired and well regarded, but kept silent for a covetous plan.

Before the August school break in 2001, my father received a message through the village RT (Radio telephone) operator.

I was to spend my August two weeks’ holiday in Suva with my aunt and her husband - our adopted older sibling now turned uncle.

I was 17 and a Year 11 student. The decision to come to Suva was the most terrifying moment of my teenage life.

I boarded the boat on Sunday and by the next morning, I arrived in Suva. The pictures are so vivid in my mind as if it was just yesterday.

We stayed together in their home, everything was fine. On the Monday night of the second week of school break, he asked my aunt if he could show me around town, and to get some barbecue.

My aunt was always tired at the end of a school day, and preferred to rest, so she agreed.

I left with him, believing that I would be safe given the experiences that my family shared with him back in the island. He was also my uncle.

Without any knowledge of his plan, I enjoyed the night, chatted with him, ate barbecue and we returned home.

The house we lived in had three rooms; the room I was occupying was directly opposite their room.

I was fast asleep that night, when I felt someone on top of me. I was awakened by the weight of the person, but I couldn’t tell who it was because the room was all dark.

A hand was on my mouth and the other trying desperately to undress me. He told me not to shout, or to say anything.

I tried to move, I tried to shout, but couldn’t. The more I tried to free myself, the more I was moved into a tight and painful position between the bed, wall and his body.

He succeeded. He raped me. I wept and was hurt. I couldn’t believe it was him. He broke my virginity that left me traumatised and victimised until today.

He told me not to cry or my aunt would hear me. He said he was sorry.

He said he did not want to marry my aunt, but did so because my dad had suggested it.

He said he used to admire me, my beauty and my weaving skills.

He said he had wanted to marry a girl just like me. He said he loved me.

He told me not to tell anyone because it was our secret, and he would marry me.

I remained silent, and couldn’t stop my tears from flowing.

I was new to Suva, and was far away from home. I was devastated.

I could not tell my aunt, I didn’t want to hurt her; I didn’t want to hurt her young family.

She would only hate and blame me for what happened. She was the only relative I knew in Suva. The person I trusted and relied upon has turned against me.

On Tuesday my aunt left for work. I felt like running away, but this was Suva and I knew nothing about the City.

It was like a prison cell staying in that room, and he, like a warden, knew his way in and out of it.

He asked for forgiveness for raping me, and said he only did so because he loved me.

I feared for my life every night after that I didn’t want to sleep. He kept saying that he would come again in the night.

On Thursday, I felt that he would do something to me in the night.

After praying, I hid under the bed in the third room. I was fast sleep, when I was dragged out from under the bed.

He raped me again.

After raping me, he told me he had $5000 ready for us to elope.

The next day was Sabbath, and my dad was going to also arrive from the island.

He asked for forgiveness and said he loved me very much. I was frightened.

We went to the church that he pastored. This was my second Sabbath in Suva. My first Sabbath, I sang in church because I loved singing.

A very young Police officer shook my hands after the song and told me it was lovely.

This Sabbath, I did not have the courage to sing. I was still hurting and I did not want to show my hurt in a gospel song.

However, the Police officer again greeted me after the service and wanted be friends. He visited our home and we would chat outside the porch.

Later on, my aunt’s husband told me that I wasn’t allowed to leave anywhere with the Police officer.

The third week, on Monday, when my aunt had left for work, he told me that in the next two weeks that my dad and I would be in Suva, I wasn’t allowed to leave with the officer.

I got so angry, and I called the officer asking him if we could go to Suva.

At the seawall, he asked me if I could be his girlfriend.

The officer said I was the perfect girl for him, because he was looking for someone who was still a virgin.

That’s when I started crying. I had wanted to share my story with someone and like a heavy cloud, it poured.

I told him I couldn’t because I was no longer a virgin. I told him I believed that virginity should be a gift to the man I wished to marry.

The Police officer was kind enough to take up the matter to another Police officer, who was also a member of my church.

They reported the matter to the head office of the church.

The pastor approached me later that afternoon at home that I write a letter saying that everything I said was not true.

As I started writing, the head of our church circuit arrived. He knew straight away what I was being told to do.

The pastor was later fired. My aunt also found out later when she asked me, and like what I thought, she blamed and hated me.

While my aunt’s husband was trying to prove his innocence, he claimed publicly that I was mentally retarded, and I was a former patient of St Giles psychiatric hospital.

Today, the pastor has become a primary school teacher and appears on his church’s TV station.

He now enjoys his life, but me?

I had met my husband, who was a new teacher graduate, while I was completing my Year 12 in 2002 in a school in Tailevu.

I remember the first time I went to my husband’s home when I got married, a lady church member, who had heard the story, stood at her doorway and shouted “na kalavo na kalavo”.

I was ashamed. The villagers were there. I told my husband that I should go back home. Luckily, I had related the entire story to him when he approached me and wanted to marry me.

I didn’t want him to hear the story from another person.

He told me that he would take care of me and he still did until today.

At times, my past would affect my relationship with my husband. I nearly committed suicide at one stage because I was being victimised.

Earlier this year, my husband and I visited a prominent women’s organisation for help and counselling.

The lady, who served us, said it was an old case and it would be difficult to trace back the incident.

I told them that what had happened to me was causing my husband to physically hit me, but they said it was a “family problem”, and it felt like they were blaming my husband.

I never went back to them because I did not feel any peace after visiting them.

When my parents found out about the incident, they couldn’t believe it.

Today I still feel the pain, the shame and the negative comments made by people who blamed me for what happened.

I have reconciled with my aunt, but met her husband only once.

My experience has taught me never to trust anyone who visits our home.