This story represents two years of work by Rael Ombuor from the Washington Post. She and her editors who were the only ones willing to listen and believe the survivors when they came forward. Having helped to facilitate this story for two years now, I have been humbled, frustrated, and surprised how hard it is to make a story like this public when vested interests with lawyers have a stake in keeping it silent - even to the detriment to the children they claim to support.
This story isn’t over with the allegations public. The victims are owed restitution from those who should have protected them. Major reforms are needed in the child protection sector globally so things like this don’t continue to happen. One motivation of the survivors I worked with was that they wanted to come forward and tell their stories so that the same things didn’t happen to others. Their strength, resilience, and courage has inspired me and motivated me through this long ordeal.
There were further allegations including even the murder of a community health worker who some claim was going to be a whistleblower many years ago, but there was not time or resources to investigate those allegations further. I’m hoping that if the story gains traction amid all the other competing and legitimate crises facing the world, additional reporting might get to the bottom of that aspect of this many branching story.
Rael Ombuor, and her editors Max Bearak (former), Katharine Houreld (current) stuck with this investigation, gave it support, and kept it from getting lost. They have lived up to the ideal that journalism should comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.