This story was written by Patricia Namutebi and originally published by Minority Africa on November 16th, 2024. This revised version is republished below as part of a content-sharing agreement. All names have been changed to protect identities.

Jane Francis never knew her father. At 15, she joined her mother for an exciting day in the city. While there, they encountered one of her mother’s friends, who exclaimed, “She really looks like you!”

“This is my sister,” her mother replied.

“My heart sank,” Francis remembers. “Later, my mom asked me to accept this because she couldn’t explain to people that I was her child.”

This left Francis in shock, but she did not press her mother for answers, as she was her only family member. It wasn’t until she turned 17 that her mother revealed the truth about her conception: She had been raped in her hostel room. Francis’ mother suspected the perpetrator was the man who rented the room next door, but he always denied it. Francis’ mother was 18 at the time.

“My mother hopes that one day she will have him arrested and a DNA test done,” Francis narrates. “She still lives in denial.”

Rape is among the most common crimes in Africa. Recent research by Equality Now highlights several obstacles survivors face in seeking justice, including insufficient legal definitions, weak law enforcement, societal rape myths, and victim-blaming. These issues prevent many cases from reaching court, with even fewer leading to convictions, enabling most perpetrators to avoid punishment. Consequently, survivors are left vulnerable, lacking both justice and the critical support services they need.

Since learning about her conception, Francis has struggled with her identity. “I do not know my father, nor do I know my clan,” she says.

I do not feel a sense of belonging. My mother says that according to our culture, it is shameful to have a child without a clan. I have to always live in disguise as her sister, she added.

She recalls an incident at school when she was asked about her surname, a name that originates from a clan:

Whenever I mention my name, I become a laughing stock as comments rise on how I have no clan. Why can’t I have my own name as I don’t belong to any clan or family?

The need to know one’s origins has never been so important as it is today in the East African country. In many Ugandan cultures, surnames are often patriarchal, reflecting the father’s lineage. They reflect ethnic, clan, and familial identities. Each ethnic group has its own naming traditions, and surnames can signify lineage, ancestry, and social status, which is crucial for social organization and relationships.

Surnames also play a crucial role in legal identification, which is essential for documentation like birth certificates, national IDs, and land ownership.

Francis often dreamed of leaving the country in search of better opportunities, hoping to start anew and create a family of her own.

Years ago, when I tried to apply for a passport at the passport office here in Uganda, my mother was told to go and get the details of my father, even if she confessed that she did not know where he was.

This requirement has changed; now, individuals do not need to provide paternal information if it is unavailable. With the creation of the National Identification and Registration Authority (NIRA) in 2015, a government entity that manages Uganda’s National Identification Register, the system has become more automated and inclusive.

Michael Muganga, the Public Relations Officer at NIRA, explains that children born from rape or unwanted pregnancies are categorized as foundlings. “At NIRA, we recognize foundlings and respect the names they identify with,” he says. The term “foundling” refers to an abandoned child and is used in official documents related to child welfare, adoption, or citizenship when the identity of the parents is unknown or they have relinquished their rights.

Muganga advises applicants to carefully review the identification form. “There is a section that says ‘father unknown.’ Any victim of rape or unwanted pregnancy should tick that box,” he explains.

However, upon examining the application form, it was found that while there is an option to select “father unknown,” allowing the form to be completed, there is no corresponding option for “mother unknown,” leaving orphans or motherless individuals without a path of recourse.

Moreover, individuals who have gone through the in-person interviews at NIRA describe a different experience. When filling out the passport application online, applicants are required to provide extensive parental details, such as clan, the mother’s maiden name, and information about their parents’ place of birth, including the village, county, and sub-county.

To verify Ugandan nationality, when asked to come for a physical interview, which also involves taking a photo and fingerprints, applicants are also asked additional questions, including those related to their mother tongue. If an applicant struggles to speak it fluently or indicates they do not speak it for various reasons, some have reported being told to bring a relative to confirm their identity.

According to Muganga, to make it easier for them to get official documents, organizations working with children of unknown parentage should carry supporting documents, like police reports, when processing identification for foundlings.

Stella Anam, director of War Victims and Children Networking (WVCN) in Northern Uganda, founded her organization to help resettle women and children affected by the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) conflict, an ongoing insurgency movement against the Ugandan government that has displaced over a million people and caused over 100,000 deaths, according to United Nations’ estimates. This conflict has displaced hundreds of thousands of children and left many orphans. WVCN assists these children, many of whom cannot trace their paternity, with registration and obtaining identification documents.

One challenge the organization faces is that, despite submitting the necessary paperwork, NIRA officials still ask these children about their fathers’ identities and clans. Anam notes that while a 2023 meeting with some NIRA officials led to some improvements, the issue remains persistent.

Aciro Sandra was four years old when she learned she was born in South Sudan, where her parents were in captivity under the LRA, led by Joseph Kony. Years later, when she applied for a national ID, she hesitated to provide her father’s details.

“I was scared of using his name because of his background,” she says. Her father had gone from prisoner to LRA commander. In 2004, her family was released and settled in Gulu town, a city in Northern Uganda. Today, her documents carry her father’s details, though she lives in a new town where no one knows her father’s past.

Since returning home, victims like Sandra face stigma, gender-based violence, and rejection.

On top of that the victims, especially the children, still suffer trauma, and rejection by their clans leading to a major identity challenge, Anam adds.

One of the beneficiaries of Anam’s initiative shares her experience:

Even if I am a victim, I cannot talk about rape. It is a taboo here, I might even never get married because of that.

Francis still grapples with the trauma of her mother’s experience. She longs for a justice system in Uganda that holds perpetrators accountable and supports victims rather than shaming them.

Sometimes, when women report rape cases, they are instead accused of being promiscuous or somehow enabling the violence, which is far from the truth,” she says, her frustration evident.

Mary Nakiranda, a lawyer with FIDA Uganda, explains that there is no special law for foundlings; they are regarded as any other children. “Since these are a result of rape, families and societies have to accept them the way they are,” she says. She adds, “If victims know the identity of the responsible parties, they should report it to the police or organizations like FIDA Uganda, which can conduct DNA tests to establish parentage. The fathers will not only take responsibility but also be charged for the crime.”

Francis, meanwhile, keeps her distance from men. “I’m still haunted by my mom’s story. I don’t feel safe around men,” she admits. “My biggest fear is having children. I worry about what life would be like for them (in terms of identity).” By Minority Africa

They say Africa is splitting along the Great East African Rift valley. The ongoing volcanic activities in the Afar region of Ethiopia is said to be but a precursor of more to come, and this may perhaps create the sea for which Ethiopia has recently been bothering all the neighbouring coastal countries. 

Ethiopia’s continuing talk of access to a sea appears to have been putting a Hobbesian fear in all the countries around it, not that it will be able to achieve, but that it will cause more damage to the region, economically, politically, and even socially, without achieving any of the illusive goals of the current Ethiopian administration. But worse will be how far it makes the people of the region drift from each other apart and hate each other for no other reason other than the grandiose madness of a leader, who knows no peace and appears to have no intention of creating peace despite being a Nobel Laureate.

Perhaps this is God’s design to keep the imperial pretenders of current day Ethiopia from the rest of the Horn of Africa States people, putting in between actual Abyssinia and hence Ethiopia and the Somali country including the part in Ethiopia, a major sea barrier. Who knows? God’s works manifest themselves in many ways! 

The process of the Somali plate drifting away from the Nubian plate and the Arabian plate has been going for many millions of years and the completion may also probably take many millions more, should the world still continue to exist or maybe shorter, in our current lifetime. 

A great part of the Afar region of Ethiopia, known as the Danakil Depression, is already below sea level and this may be submerged by floods from the Red sea to create a sea barrier between Somalia and Ethiopia, two countries that could have been friends but where such friendship is always made impossible by the desire of Ethiopia to take over Somali lands. 

Abyssinia has already taken a large portion of the Somali lands in the Horn of Africa, with the connivance of European colonial powers towards the end of the nineteenth century, when the small king of Shoa, Menelik II, rose to become an emperor of Abyssinia through forceful acquisition of many nations into his empire. This was further consolidated through a change of name to Ethiopia in 1932 by the then Emperor Haile Selassie, Ex- Ras Tafari, son of Ras Makonnen, a Chief Advisor to Emperor Menelik II. With a sea barrier separating the two countries, Abyssinia and Somalia may then become friends after all! 

However, one thing most pundits ignore, is the fact that there are people who live in the region affected by the volcanic activity today – the Afar people. One does not see many discussing the difficulties these people face, including their own government, which is busy threatening not only its own other nationalities (the Amhara, the Tigrayans, the Benishangul, the Somalis, and others), but also its neighbours.

The Afar population is some three million souls, and they would need to move on to other parts of Ethiopia. The Afar State is one of the driest and hottest regions of Ethiopia and continues to affect the lives of many of the population of the region, and the current flare up of the volcanic activity would only cause more problems and difficulties for the population.

It is where solidarity among the people of the Horn of Africa States is important and needed beyond the unnecessary antagonistic competition of the governments of the region, where each one is working hard to undermine the other. It is, indeed, one area they could all work together to ease the pains of the Afar people, who face a great disaster, even well-equipped countries would find difficulties managing them. The current fires in the Unites States is but an example where natural disasters can devastate large territories where people lived in peace.

It is high time, perhaps, the governments of the Horn of Africa States region dealt with this Hobbesian fear of each other and worked together when natural disasters strike in any part of the region. This would have brought people of the region closer together in the place of worrying that each country is out to get the other, as is going on today between Ethiopia and Somalia. There is a need for a new social contract in the region, just as the United Nations Organization was founded, to address fear of another great war.

A Horn of Africa States platform organized as a regional economic block would have addressed many of the contention issues including sovereignty, integrity and unity of each country, without one country taking over or threatening to take over the territory of another. A regional platform would have allowed economic cooperation, development of rail and road connections, airports and seaports to attend the needs of the region both in terms of internal trade and external trade and in investments and attracting more capital to the region from other parts of the world.

This would have also allowed the exploitation of the resources of the region in terms of both sub-soil and above soil wealth. The location of the region alone would have attracted many millions of mobile populations to add on to the already bulging population of the region of some 170 million people – a sizeable market and a source of youthful labor force.

A concerted effort from the countries and nations of the region to extend help to the Afar people, in their hour of need today, would be a great opener for such closer relations among the countries of the region. By Dr. Suleiman Walhad, Eurasia

A senior Kenyan banker risks being arrested after South Sudan police issued a warrant of arrest in an escalation of a Sh722 million row between his employer and a customer. 

The South Sudan police issued an international warrant of arrest against Fredrick Owuor, South Sudan’s head of Stanbic Bank, over a dispute with Air Afrik.

“Whereas Fredrick Owuor Ouko stands charged the offence under section 36/366/110 of the Penal Code, 2008, you are hereby directed to arrest the said person and bring him before the crime officer in charge of the police station and investigator,” the warrant says. 

On one hand, the bank says in court that the airline owes it money wired to its account while on the other, the airline accuses the bank of illegally freezing its account and withdrawing money without authority.

Already, the High Court in Nairobi froze any action by the Director of Criminal Investigations (DCI) and Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) against the bank’s boss, Joshua Oigara who moved to court over the matter.

There is a separate battle pitting the two before the Court of Appeal. 

Air Afrik’s managing director Eric Lugalia in the commercial case accused Stanbic of freezing their accounts and then deducting money from them illegally without authorisation.

Lugalia alleged that this led to the loss of business for the airline. 

He further says that after the move, the airline was unable to meet the aviation contractual obligations it had with the South Sudanese government.

In reply, the bank denied owing Air Afrik any money. Instead, it argued it should be compensated $1.1 million (Sh143 million) that Air Afrik withdrew in February 2020.

According to the lender, the money in question was credited erroneously to the Airline’s account. 

It wants the court to order the Bank of South Sudan (BoSS) and Air Afrik to be ordered to refund the amount in addition to four per cent per month interest from February 19, 2016 to February 8, 2017.

It asserted that BoSS failed to honour its obligation to credit the airline with actual money amounting to Sh722 million despite repeated requests to do so.

At the same time, it claimed that BoSS misrepresented to Air Afrik that actual funds had been credited into the Bank’s account.

In his statement supporting the case, Owuor said that on February 8, 2016, Stanbic received credit advice from the Bank of South Sudan (BoSS) to wire $7.2 million to Air Afrik’s Nostro account.

A Nostro account is one that a bank holds with a foreign bank, which is normally in the currency of the country where the funds are held.

He said that the credit advice was not backed by actual funds despite Stanbic going ahead to credit the Nostro account with the funds.

“In normal practise, such funds would reflect as a credit balance on the customer’s account but would not reflect in the available balance, until actual funds have been received, in this case by BoSS wiring the corresponding funds to the Nostro Account.”

Erroneously credited

According to Owuor, the credit made by Stanbic was only a paper credit transaction that reflects on their books for internal accounting, but it does not translate to the remittance of available funds.

He said that Stanbic wrote to BoSS on February 9, requesting the bank to wire the money to the Nostro Account to enable them to complete the transaction but BoSS did not respond to the letter or honour the request.

Between February 11 and 12, Owuor claimed that the airline withdrew a total of $1.1 million from its accounts.

He argued that Stanbic had not yet received the money from BoSS.

Following the development, Owuor said, they froze the airline’s accounts and made further follow-ups with BoSS but got no response.

The court heard that this prompted Stanbic to notify Air Afrik’s Managing Director that the $7.2 million had been erroneously credited to their accounts.

“Thereafter on 22nd February 2016, the bank wrote to the Director General of BoSS seeking the reversal in the Clearing Account of the residual balance of the credit amount amounting to USD 6,107,500.00. BoSS did not respond,” said Owuor.

On April 21, 2016, Owuor said, that Stanbic wrote to BoSS requesting it to fulfil its outstanding obligations by crediting the Nostro account with amounts that had accrued over time for several transactions, but it did not respond.

Owuor stated that on the same day, they received a letter from the airline dated April 20 demanding full payment of the remaining $6 million plus an apology.

He also said that Stanbic then wrote back refuting the demand from Air Afrik and further demanded a refund of the $1.1 million that had been deposited in the airline’s accounts and withdrawn.

Owuor further said that on July 5, the bank received a letter from the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) seeking information over the dispute, saying that Air Afrik had filed a complaint against them.

It emerged that while CBK was still probing the matter, Stanbic, Air Afrik and BoSS officials met in Nairobi to resolve the matter, which ended with BoSS promising to deposit the money.

On February 8, 2017, the court heard that BoSS finally transferred $1.5 million to the Nostro account, and Stanbic deducted the $1.1 million that Air Afrik had withdrawn and deposited the remaining $400,000 into the airline accounts.

Owuor further added that on April 20, 2017, BoSS deposited $5.7 million into the clearing account.

According to him, this confirmed that the credit advice did not represent actual funds.

He argued that BoSS was at the heart of the mess saying that its own communication showed instructions to transfer $2 million in two tranches in May and August 2017.

Owuor added that this confirmed that BoSS had not provided credit advice for the $1.5 million paid in February 2017.

He said that BoSS was liable to pay the outstanding balance due to the airline.

Erroneous withdrawal

According to Owuor, Stanbic notified Air Afrik that the payment would come from BoSS and not them. He said that Stanbic is seeking $1.1 million in interest from the airline and BoSS for the erroneous withdrawal by Air Afrik.

“It is the bank’s position that BoSS failed to honour its obligation to credit the offshore USD Nostro Account with actual funds in the sum of $7.2 million despite repeated requests to do so and misrepresented to Air Afrik that actual funds had been credited into the bank’s accounts,” he said.

Owuor wants Stanbic exempted from any orders that may be made against it in a compensation case filed by the airline.

“In addition to the foregoing, Air Afrik and BoSS maliciously caused highly damaging material concerning the bank to be published by the Kenyan media houses in relation to the alleged failure by the bank to honour the Credit Advice dated 5th February 2016.”

The bank CEO, Oigara was in December last year summoned by South Sudanese authorities over the row.

Here in Kenya, he had been summoned by DCI officers but got orders stopping his arrest or harassment, saying they were based on a false complaint.

The DCI’s Banking Investigative Fraud Unit (BIFU) summoned Oigara to shed more light on the eight-year dispute.

In getting the orders, Oigara and the bank through Senior Counsel Kamau Karori said that on the day the DCI summoned him, he had joined President William Ruto for an exhibition at the Kenyatta International Convention Centre (KICC).

Kamau said his client was not working at Stanbic when the dispute from the transaction arose adding that the move to have the matter probed by authorities in South Sudan and Kenya was meant to intimidate Stanbic.

According to Kamau, the DCI said it is investigating the alleged offence of fraud and false accounting.

The lawyer said the complaint had already been probed and the bank was cleared of any wrongdoing. Kamau added that Air Afrik had lodged a complaint with the CBK over the same dispute but it was thrown out.

CBK allegedly found that the bank had done nothing wrong by debiting amounts it had erroneously wired to the firm.

A case filed by the airline against the bank at the High Court’s Commercial Division was frozen after Stanbic got an order from the Court of Appeal.

The bank protested a ruling by Justice Nixon Sifuna saying that it stopped them from telling its side of the story since they had to get permission from the airline to even file a witness statement. By Fred Kagonye, The Standard