Damaris Muthee’s murder points to deeper relations issues

The worst thing about a woman being slapped by a man, is not so much the pain. It is mostly about what happens after the perpetrator palm has done its job. The way the heat of the action makes you tear up, making it look like you’re crying, even if you aren’t.

Especially when you aren’t. It’s the way the tears force you to look away or leave the room, embarrassment coursing through your veins – leaving the abuser looking like the winner in whatever fight you two were having, and you, a loser twice over.

And that’s just a slap. Imagine how it would make you feel to have your partner holds a knife to your throat, and then proceeds to stab you.

Or when they wrestle you to the point of exhaustion before strangling you to death? If they could speak from the other world, how would our sisters and brothers who have died in the hands of their partners describe their final moments?

These are the thoughts that seized my mind early this week when I heard news of Damaris Muthee Mutua, the 28-year-old Kenyan-Bahraini athlete who was found murdered in Iten, with preliminary investigation pointing to strangulation by her boyfriend, an Ethiopian athlete. I found myself thinking, “Again? So soon after Agnes Tirop. You’ve got to be kidding me!”

Now, as I write this, a question screams out for an answer that no one seems able to provide. Could it be that some men are so powerful that they are being overpowered by their violent tendencies? Are men like Eskinder Folie, the suspect in Damaris’s murder, simply unable to express themselves verbally, which is why they take it out on their significant others physically?

Could such men be knowing that they shouldn't be doing what they do to their partners when they come home drunk at night, but they just can’t stop? These men who grab their girlfriends by the neck or smack them full force on the face or back them up against the car, could they be beating their breasts when all is quiet and saying to themselves, “Okay, I'm going to have to tame this now?”

Same questions go to women who abuse their partners. Do we need rehabilitation centres for people who admit they can’t stop physically fighting their partners?

I imagine that somewhere in their collective soul, those who abuse their partners know that their luck will soon run out.

No romantic relationship was ever built on coercion, physical fights or harassment. But that only seems to make some of them more determined to mess up as much as they can, while they still have the chance.

The result is that thoughtless, flailing form of love that men like Eskinder have decided is their best means of staying on top.

The Ethiopian suspect will soon be arrested. And when he is presented before the law, he will surely look shamed and desperate, as we have seen in similar cases in the past.

I ask, should we switch our focus from punishing perpetrators of gender-based violence and instead offer counselling to those who admit they can’t do without laying hands on their partners? Will we save more lives then?

Because it appears the big ideas that were compiled at the various GBV in sports conferences that were held following the death of Agnes Tirop are simply not enough to stem this vice.

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