Child rape remains a painful subject, often shrouded in silence and shame. Nadine, not her real name, is a 19-year-old Gabonese woman, shattered by years of abuse and violence since childhood.

And today, she's trying to rebuild her life despite the lasting after-effects. A heartbreaking testimony has been collected. The silence continues to gnaw at Nadine's heart. Nadine, a silence born of a trauma experienced nearly twelve years ago, when she was just a child. At the time, she was living in Koulamoutou, in a family home, where she should have felt safe. But in Libreville, her uncle repeatedly abused her with brutality.

"I was raped at the age of 7 by my mother's older brother. We lived in Koulamoutou, but we always came to spend the holidays with my uncle in Libreville. Every school holiday, we always went to his house there, to spend the holidays, like my mother and I, not my father. He would take the pillowcase to put in my face, so I couldn't scream. And on top of that, he raped me."

she says.

"And I always told my mother that, I told my mother that, she never believed me."

"She always told me no, her big brother can't do that, her big brother we can't do that."

"He raped me from the age of 7 to 12."

How can a mother hush up this kind of scandal? How can a mother hand her daughter over to a habitual rapist? This is what the family would have preferred to avoid shame, to protect the no. But this omerta has left deep scars. At 19, Nadine still lives with the fear, nightmares, and pain of a past she never chose.

"We talked about it, but until today, the case has dragged on. We haven't gone to the authorities."

"My screams and calls for help dragged on in the middle of my family like that. My parents shut it down like that."

"But today, I live with this trauma because I already have a child. Today I am 19 years old. If we count from when I was 12, when the affair ended, until today, I live with a trauma that is not easy for me because things really happened."

"Really, I mean maybe it was God who sent my big brother that day, because when I went to the hospital with my big brother at the clinic in Ice, they discovered that I had blood stones inside me, and it was the gynecologist who cleaned me up."

"The gynecologist cleaned me up and the gynecologist said my labia are injured, my lower labia are injured, and I couldn't even give birth vaginally."

"Because of that, even in my relationship with the father of my child, it's a little difficult because every time we have intimate moments, the images come back to me and sometimes we stop."

Yet psychological help remains rare, and fear of speaking out remains pervasive. Many victims do not dare file a complaint, fearing the way others will look at them or the reaction of their loved ones. Cases of rape of minors are numerous in Gabon. But convictions remain rare.

"I grew up like that, I didn't see a shrink because no one took me. To this day, no one talks about my mother anymore, the after-effects stayed with me. Because I live with it, it's not something that's easy for me."

"The message I can give to some parents is to be attentive to children, because a 7-year-old child cannot come and lie."

on repeated rape.

"Even a teenager can't come and lie about something."

"If they're not sure what the child is saying, they can go to the hospital for an examination. Only a gynecologist can decide whether the child was raped or not. My mother didn't do anything."

"The only thing she told me was that her grandchild can't do that."

"Even advising me, after the meeting we had to do in the morning, that we had talked about this."

After that, his mother closed the file altogether.

"My mom never talked to me about it again, asking me how I felt, what was going on, what I had observed."

"Even when I tried to take me to the hospital, my mother never did."

Today, Nadine hopes that by telling her story, other young girls will find the strength to speak out, to denounce, and above all, to heal. Because behind every silence, there is a shattered life and a cry waiting to be heard.

“This testimony is deeply moving. As a criminal psychologist, I emphasize the importance of breaking the family code of silence. Rape of a minor is a serious crime, with no statute of limitations in some countries. For justice to be done, medical evidence must be collected (gynecological reports, traces of past trauma), clinical records must be consulted, and family or neighbor testimonies must be sought. The victim's testimony, especially if it is consistent and precise, has significant judicial value. It is very important that the perpetrator be prosecuted to avoid impunity and prevent further attacks.”

explains a medical source.