whisper

#JusticeForNoura 

SIGN AGAINST THE DEATH PENALTY OF NOURA HUSSEIN

“At 16, Noura was forcibly married off by her father. She refused, and in protest left her family home on the outskirts of Khartoum to stay with her aunt in Sinnar, a city almost 250 kilometres away. Noura lived with her relative for three years before her father called to say that the wedding was cancelled and that she should come home.

Upon her arrival, Noura found that she had been tricked, that the wedding to which she had never agreed was still happening, and shortly after was given away to her unchosen husband.

According to her testimony, Noura refused to consummate the marriage, resisting him for the first four days. On the fifth, she says her husband raped her, with the help of a number of his male relatives (cousins and some people said the husband’s brothers as well), pinned her down while he was raping her right before their eyes. The following day, when her husband attempted to rape her again, she stabbed him in self-defence and it killed him. When she told her family, her father delivered her to the police, and then disowned her.

That was in 2017. On Sunday, April 29, 2018, Noura was found guilty in court of premeditated murder, the punishment for which is death by hanging.”

In times of crisis, the wise build bridges, while the foolish build barriers. We must find a way to look after one another as if we were one single tribe.

I knew that I wasn’t straight, but I didn’t know if I was gay, I didn’t know if I was bisexual - I didn’t feel comfortable having that conversation with myself. I was 20 when I came out the first time. It got to a point where I had fallen in love with a friend, and one of my other best friends had sort of noticed. And there were rumors going around in the dance world back home. It was breaking my heart. I was going crazy and I didn’t know what to do. I was lying and lying and lying, and doing everything I could to hold on to my secret. Because I hadn’t figured it out yet, and so it felt like everyone else was deciding it for me and they knew better than I did. It was really scary.