Cameroon :: Kondengui Penitentiary: When Hunger Feeds Sex :: Cameroon
At Kondengui prison in Yaoundé, hunger justifies the means. This is evidenced by certain lewd practices observed at the main penitentiary in Yaoundé.
This is particularly the case of these young people who prostitute themselves to survive. Not a day, or even better, night, goes by without reports of acts of sodomy in one of the two most populous areas of the prison. Wards 8 and 9 have around 3,000 inmates, more than half of the approximately 5,000 people incarcerated here. The most recent case dates back just a few days, when the young AC, against his will, hit the headlines.
When he was interned in Ward 8 in Room 85, he had no idea of the dangers awaiting him. How in fact would you be wary of a benefactor who, in this hell, generously extends his hand to you? So HB who, spontaneously, took poor AC under his wing upon his arrival. The latter, deprived of visitors, is subject to the “Internal regime”.
In other words, he must be content with the food offered to him by the administration: barely a handful of dry boiled corn tinged with red oil (the beans which should accompany it are found on parallel sale in the prison). Called a ration, this unsavory daily pittance is served once a day, and you have to flex your muscles, when you don’t have a relationship, to have one. This “Kontchap” is the prerogative of the poorest, nicknamed the “Floating”. A very colorful expression which relatively reflects reality.
Cuckold lovers
It is easy to imagine the overpopulation and promiscuity that reign in this place. In a room of around 4/4m like the one where our two fellows live, it is not uncommon to find more than thirty occupants. The more polished ones have their “mandate”, that is to say a single berth on a bunk bed.
Each bed has three mandates. Depending on means, seniority, length of sentence or simply financial strength, one can afford to occupy their mandate alone, or share it.
Many poor people, who therefore do not have the means to afford a berth, literally “float” in the neighborhood, sleeping either on the ground in the premises (these are the aptly named “dormaterres”), or on benches. outdoor fortune telling in the yard. Because they have no place to sleep, although officially assigned to a premises. We therefore understand that AC felt privileged when HB offered him protection, and above all, food. It must be said that HB is a “tackler”, that is to say a traveling salesman who roams the entire prison offering his merchandise. This is essentially made up of personal objects (clothing, watches, shoes, devices, etc.) that other prisoners in need (generally new arrivals) entrust to him to sell for a commission. That means he has money.
Sources therefore say that the trader introduced amphetamines into food that he gave to his protégé. AC ate and, once under the influence of drugs, suffered the assaults of his “benefactor”, who copiously plowed his behind. Caught in the act, the two friends experienced varying fortunes: AC. was thrown into a disciplinary cell, while HB calmly continued his activities. His money has undoubtedly spoken. The law of the best saying without doubt. In any case, this case, the umpteenth of its kind, raises the problem of the sexuality of prisoners.
Deprived of their companions for the men, and of their companions for the women, the inmates of Kondengui are forced, to satisfy their libido, to indulge in clandestine love affairs. Although homosexuality is repressed by law, some prisoners have, through force of circumstances, become notorious queers. In the crude language of the industry, they are called “anus fuckers”. Most of them are sentenced to long sentences. The youngest are their favorite prey. Couples are officially formed in the obscurity of certain mandates. We know and it is whispered that this is “the wife” of another. Since condoms are prohibited here, the practice is full contact, with all the consequences one can imagine.
Some women are also transformed into lesbians, to benefit from the generosity of their more well-off comrades in misfortune. Of course, there are only individuals who nature has predisposed to these inclinations.
Those who are repelled by these practices manage as best they can: either they masturbate in secret, or they maintain platonic relationships with inmates they maintain; at the risk of starving themselves. An intense epistolary exchange then takes place, via couriers, where the ladies’ fiery declarations of love are immediately followed by a request for money…to eat. In return, and in the absence of carnal favors, they sometimes receive dishes of food prepared by a woman: a real luxury! Prisoners then ruin themselves to maintain their rank with their “wives”. The latter, without scruples, look elsewhere at the slightest financial failure of Jules.
Moreover, they do not hesitate to maintain several idylls. A former Director of central administration went through this frustrating ordeal. This rich and honorable father of around sixty years old filmed himself naked. He then sent the digital device to his sweetheart in the women’s neighborhood, so that she could contemplate his plasticity. However, the courier, by return mail (the beauty had in turn posed in Adam’s outfit), made the wrong recipient and gave it to another lover of the young woman. Who, to take revenge, hastened to hand over the device to the prison authorities.
The former senior civil servant, formerly a tenant of district 12, was disciplinary transferred to district 3. A much less upscale place; but he could have had worse. It is common for poor people to have their portrait corrected just for having cast a lecherous glance at “a reserved file”. This time, our Director got away with some sarcasm. And mocking looks which, in other times and places, would have earned their perpetrators a stay… in Kondengui prison.
