Down a broken street in Kinshasa, behind an unmarked metal door and a courtyard shaded by a mango tree, sits a small house where a group of traumatised women hide from the world. They call themselves the Invisibles. Crowded onto bunk beds, they tremble as they describe the night last September when thousands of male inmates broke out of Makala prison — the largest in the Democratic Republic of the Congo — and stormed the women’s wing, a place so overcrowded it has been described as the “ante-room to Hell.” Over nearly six hours, around 300 women were raped. Some were assaulted by ten or more attackers; others still cannot walk. One woman, hunched and silent, seems unable to speak at all.
Their ordeal, documented in Times UK, did not end when the attackers left. Instead of receiving support, many survivors were shunned by their families and abandoned by husbands in a society where rape carries deep and cruel stigma. One woman said her husband died of shock upon hearing what had happened. Another explained that even her siblings refused to speak to her. These women now rely on shelters run by activists such as Anny Modi, supported by the Catholic chaplaincy, which offer sanctuary from both danger and disgrace. It was here that Sophie, Duchess of Edinburgh, visibly shaken, met them during her recent visit to the DRC.
Despite threats and fears of retaliation, a small group of survivors is taking the Congolese government to court for failing to protect them while they were in state custody. Makala prison was built for 1,500 people but held 14,000 on the night of the jailbreak. A United Nations Population Fund report found that 268 of the 348 female prisoners were raped, including 17 girls aged 18 or under. Yet only 11 women, out of the more than 100 who spoke to barrister Kwamba Tshingej Frédéric, have dared to join the legal case, terrified of the stigma and the potential repercussions at home. Frédéric himself has received threats but insists he must continue, saying that if he abandons the women, “no one will.”
The atrocity has drawn international condemnation. Yvette Cooper, the UK foreign secretary, called the Makala rapes “horrific crimes” and evidence that violence against women and girls has become a global epidemic. She stressed that rape is increasingly used as a weapon in conflicts from Sudan to Myanmar and vowed to make combatting sexual violence central to UK foreign policy. Cooper will host a meeting with survivors at the Foreign Office to remind global leaders of their UN commitment, made 25 years ago, to protect women in conflict and ensure they participate in peace and security processes.
Among the survivors is Sylvie, a human rights activist from Goma, who gave a harrowing account from the Panzi Clinic in Kinshasa, where she is receiving reparative surgery. Imprisoned for three years without trial after encouraging young men to leave armed groups, she said the women’s wing of Makala was already overwhelmed, with inmates sleeping two to a bed or on the floor. She recalled hearing gunfire just after midnight and being warned by phone that male prisoners were trying to escape. By 2am, thousands had broken through. Naked men flooded the women’s cells. The screams went unanswered. “It was complete carnage,” she said. “We were around 300 women and were invaded by more than 5,000 men. One woman was raped by 15 to 20 prisoners. Two died.”
She described being raped by four men, losing everything she owned, and watching the inmates loot whatever remained. Their attackers told them they were “already the undead,” and that the mass rape was meant as a message to the government. The women begged for help, but no guards came until morning, long after the damage was done. Sylvie, bruised and bleeding, was moved to a military prison and later released, but she cannot return home because her city is now under control of M23 militia. She says rape there is systematic — but that being assaulted in a state-run facility meant to protect her is beyond comprehension.
Dr Denis Mukwege, the Nobel peace laureate who founded the Panzi Clinic with his prize money to treat survivors of sexual violence, said several of the Makala victims are now under his care. He condemned the government’s failure to protect them, noting that a year later there have been no answers, no accountability, and no state-led support. His clinic, he said, has become their refuge only because no one else has taken responsibility.
As Sylvie told the Duchess of Edinburgh, she feels invisible, unheard and abandoned. “I cannot unsee what happened,” she said. “Often, I can’t sleep. I go back to that night again and again.”
