”I have reported the incident to the police, yet after I had narrated my ordeal, the officer- in-charge told me to get out of his office, and then he told me to go home and be happy and thank my stars for the experience.

Two ladies live in a flat next door and about a month ago one of them started making advances towards me. I ignored her because I did not want to be in a relationship with a woman in the same house. Then three weeks ago she started talking dirty to me whenever we met and expressed my displeasure to her behavior. This did not stop her as her friend joined in and were telling me how nice it will be to fuck me. In fact I became quite angry with them for showing disrespect and they apologized, they then began behaving nicely as ladies.

Last week under the pretext of introducing three lady-friends of theirs to me, they entered my hall and after exchanging greeting all five of them sat-down to chat with me. I was in a singlet and a per of shorts. Before I could say “jack” they held me to the carpet on my back and in a struggle ripped my shorts, pants and singlet off. I thought they were going to kill me for SAKAWA so I started shouting and one covered my month with a handkerchief.

With four of them holding me pressed on the carpet the first lady I referred to earlier started touching my penis which naturally erected. She then gave me a “blow job”,(put the penis in her mouth and socked it)then started kissing me all over my body with her tongue: from my penis to the tummy then my nipples. Even though I was burning with all these caresses I refused to be kissed and she ended up with her tongue in my ear. Meanwhile one of the ladies had started giving a “blow job“with another busily socking my nipple.

To be sincere I was feeling something I had never felt before. Then I felt my penis entering deep into one of the ladies, but I was determined not to have an orgasm since the act was against my wish and without a condom. After about a minute or so I heard her shout with joy exploding into an orgasm and I could feel on my penis that she was quite wet. Another immediately wiped my penis with a handkerchief and again I could feel my penis entering her. Oh! She really gave me a fuck and her friends did things to me that felt .... I fainted. When I gained consciousness they were sponging me and there was fear in their eyes, they thought I was going to die.

Now the second one says that she did not have her turn and that she will have it whether I like it or not. Should I tell my girl friend? Are there no laws in Ghana that protect men against rape?”

This was posted by one Yorke on Ghanaweb Casual Phorum some time last year; both the title and the body of the posting makes interesting reading, more so is the last sentence which happens to be a pertinent question. It is unfortunate that Yorke did not provide the names and location of the lady-rapists nor mention the police station he lodged his complaint; the story may either be true or untrue. A transposition of Yorke’s experience to that of a woman would attract massive media and public condemnation and provide the police a platform and an opportunity to demonstrate their agility in arresting the culprits. Then in the usual by-all-means-justify-the-action manner, the fine gentleman, palm wine quaffing mustached PRO of the Ghana Police Service DSP Kwasi Ofori will comment on TV/FM. Meanwhile the Minister for Women’s Affairs, the Ursula Owusus, the Ama Oye Luethers, the Women’s Manifesto Coalition, and NGOs etc., etc., would inevitably seize the opportunity to heat up the matter.

The posting epitomizes an imbalance in gender advocacy in relation to rape;another is the twisted mentality of society on the issue of rape. The perception of society on rape center around the notion that: (i) only women get raped, (ii) a man can not be raped (iii) any man will enjoy being raped by a woman no matter the circumstance (iv) its OK for a woman to rape a man (v) a man has no right to complain when he is raped by a woman (vi) that the number of men raped as compared to women is negligible to warrant action. These views are despicable to say the least; unfortunately they are held by both men and women alike, educated or uneducated.

A comment on the same page in reaction to the posting by some one who calls himself “Dying To Be You” and who presumably is a man go as follows: quote “The police man was right, you must be short for reporting such a beautiful experience to the police. haaaaaaa! ooooooh!!! How I wish I was you.” Unquote. There is a festival celebrated on the island of Bali in Indonesia where on the set day, men ran away from their villages because they are bound to be raped by woman on sight.

The question that usually comes up is: how can a woman rape a man? Well let’s take these scenarios. Say you are both naked in bed, kissing, touching etc., she is enjoying the romance and urging you with all the noises and all that; she is wet, I mean really wet, yet she refuses to let you enter her because she say she does not want to have sex. Then taking her off guard you enter her against her wish and out of control she goes with the flow, yet against her wish. She gets angry after the act because she did not want to have sex. Can this act be termed rape? Yes! The fact that a woman is wet does not necessary mean she wants to have sex, on the other hand the fact that a man has an erection does not mean he wants to have sex. Now let’s take the transposition of this scenario: in this case it is the man who does not want to have sex. Naturally just as a woman will get wet in the circumstance, a man will have erection. Taking advantage of lying on top of the man, she takes him off guard and insert his penis into her vagina, sit on and it enters her; the man gets carried away with the hump and the act is done against his wish. Can this be termed as rape? I will leave that to you to decide. Males from infancy some times have erections they have no intention or control of; at times a man may wonder why he has an erection and the erection could occur any where and at anytime; a mans erection is purely a psychological matter; at times and in certain situations a man can not have an erection even if he desire so much to have one What about situations where one is threatened, blackmailed, his resistance overcome either by force or by the threat of death or serious bodily harm, or so intoxicated, drugged, or mentally incompetent as to be incapable of granting effective consent? Don’t you think these conditions can apply to a man? Just as women dread and will never want some kind of men touch them, so do men. The biblical figure Lot (see Genesis 19:30-38)was drugged by his daughters so they could have sex with him. Would Lot have had sex knowingly and with a clear head with his own daughters? Just imagine if Lot had detected that his daughters had drugged and raped him, the mere realization of having sex with his own children under any circumstance would have broken his heart and sent him to an early grave. For any human be it male or female, to be made to have sex with a person against his/her wish, consent or conscience is a crime of the crudest, most humiliating and degrading order that eats the soul and destroys the individual beyond the imagination. Lot’s daughters may have been sex-starved; a woman’s sexual needs and the desire to have children in certain situations could weigh so much on her to the extent of desperation. Naturally, a young woman is beautiful, luscious and succulent with an embrace so soothing that a man would want to be buried in and go to sleep for ever; her passion is deep and unfettered, lips inviting, nipples like secret street lights, her buttocks may be big or small nonetheless mesmerizing; it doesn’t matter whether or not her legs are midget walking sticks or powerful industrial cranes, what is between them is and will always be a passport to heaven. In modern times the situation of Lots daughters befall many women: sex-starved wives, older girls/women who are off-the-road, born-ones and born-twos etc., who are unmarried or are not in any relationship, divorcees, widows, pompous and ostentatious ladies, spinsters and unmarried ladies who carry themselves about like married women as well as too-known women with kati-kati mouths; others are women who are shameless sexholics and those that desperately want men.As life symphony keeps repeating itself, so will men find older women unappealing and so go after young women; do women covertly react in the same manner towards young men? A comment by one Araba Aborkuma also on the same page of the posting is noteworthy, quote: ”From the reactions to this particular posting, I believe if Parliament is to promulgate a law particularly to protect men from rape, the CJA and the AFAG will jointly organize massive demonstrations in Accra, all regional capitals and districts of Ghana against it. All the same men must be protected from rape, because women are seriously raping men these days. The story is something, but the reality is there”. Unquote The common law felony of rape is referred to as forcible rape. It is defined as unlawful sexual intercourse with a woman by a man who was not her husband, without the woman's consent. Rape can occur when the woman’s resistance is overcome either by force or by the threat of death or serious bodily harm. Sexual intercourse with a woman who is unconscious or so intoxicated, drugged, or mentally incompetent as to be incapable of granting effective consent may also constitute rape. Some modern statutes define rape to include forced sex by a husband with his wife. Some countries have rewritten their forcible and statutory rape laws to make them gender neutral. Under these modern statutes a male can be considered a victim of rape—either at the hands of a woman or another man. Canada has such law on rape, but no woman has ever been convicted in Canada under the law because it is difficult to prove in a court of law that a woman has raped a man. Homosexual or lesbian rape, when it is not covered by a country’s general rape statute, may be covered by statutes that prohibit anal or oral sex between members of the same sex, a type of sodomy. One may wonder why over the years, law reform on rape tended only to protect women. It may be because of the bias laws on rape that persisted over the centuries in all cultures and the ill manner women have been treated. In some ancient societies women were treated as a form of property and rape was defined as an offense against the property owner - the woman’s father or husband - not against the woman herself. For example, the Old Testament book of Deuteronomy, which delineates ancient Hebrew law, provides that if an unmarried virgin is raped the offender must pay the woman’s father 50 shekels and marry the woman. This law reflects the belief that a rapist could atone for his crime by marrying his victim. Such laws indicate that the society did not view the injury done to the woman as the essence of the offense of rape. Even in the Akan society where the man is punished for rape and his family bears the shame of the punishment, the woman also bears the brunt of stigmatization all her life. In some Islamic countries women are stoned to death for being victims of rape.

Some time ago the regional boss of the Domestic Violence and Victims Support Unit (DOVVSU) of the Ghana Police in the Central Region stated on a local FM station that a woman can not rape a man. Yes, she was right to the extent that before the law only a woman can be raped and so therefore a woman can not be arrested or prosecuted for rape in Ghana; but in reality some men have experienced the agony of being rape victims, whilst some women enjoy being the perpetrators. The most worrying thing is that, most women rapist taunt their victims after the act and with impunity repeat the offence. It is therefore unfair for only men to be convicted for an offence that in reality is committed by both sexes; further more, a husband and not a wife can be convicted for raping the spouse; yet in the bedroom the man could be the victim and every married person or anybody in a relationship know this. How can one determine that a man has been raped? It is not easy. To the determine whether or not a woman has been raped, a medical officer will in case of a virgin, examine the girl to find out if her hymen has been broken, look for sings of penetration, abrasions, pain, pregnancy etc., and these are tangible indicators. For a woman who is not a virgin: possible penetration, abrasions, pain, semen and pregnancy etc. - doctors too dey see things oh! Hmm - a man has no hymen to be broken, nor can one determine penetration by examining a penis, a woman will not leave any semen on a man penis or make him pregnant, there could be abrasions or pain, but it would be difficult to link them to rape in a court of law; may be DNA test of traces of fluid on the man’s penis. With modern technology I think some scientific approach or medical methodology could be developed to determine whether or not a man has been raped, but till then …… I imagine the day a woman will be arrested and arranged before court for rape: how the matter will be handled by the police and the court, the reactions of women’s groups, the public and the media; for many the idea is inconceivable.

Kojo Mbeah P. O. Box CC1002 Cape Coast, Ghana Kojo_mbeah@yahoo.com