Empowerment, or lack thereof

Today I cried, not because of any pain of my own, but I cried because I shared a pain beyond belief. I sought and failed to get any words of consolation so I just shared the tears.
A few months ago I wrote an article on sexual abuse in tertiary institutions in Zimbabwe for The WIP http://thewip.net/contributors/2011/05/the_price_of_education_sexual.html and as I was researching it I got to know the young ladies I was writing about. Today one of them called me with a painful story about how her lecturer sexually abused her. She had with her results for an HIV test. This young lady who only wanted to make the best of her life now has to face the greatest challenge of her life. She is pregnant and HIV positive. What do I even say to her? How do we empower these ladies when all efforts at empowerment are met with such spirit defeating challenges?

Ladies, let's raise our voices against these forms of dis-empowerment. We are afterall the voices of the future.