For a long time, I have asked myself what is the boiling point for Kenyans? What else needs to happen to make us rise up and say enough is enough as rape and other gender crimes continue to rise? Just how many more women and girls have to become rape statistics before we can get truly angry about it? Does a healthy society allow its daughters to be raped? Does our silent complacency send out a message that we are a society that condones such acts?

In June, in the remote village of Tingolo in Busia county, western Kenya, police officers decided that an appropriate punishment for six young men who had gang-raped and left for dead a 16-year-old girl (known as Liz) was to cut the grass in front of the police station and provide the victim with some money for cheap painkillers.

There have been no formal prosecutions and some Kenyan police officers have been reported as casting doubt on the validity of the testimony Liz gave, despite the fact she is now paralysed, and destined to spend the rest of her life in a wheelchair.

In collaboration with the Open Society Foundation, my organisation, the Coalition on Violence against Women (Covaw), has been providing legal support and counselling to Liz and her family, while at the same time engaging the police and the office of the director of public prosecutions (DPP) to fight for due diligence.

Internationally, the case has captured people's imaginations, and a global campaign, Justice for Liz, calling for the immediate prosecution of the rapists and full disciplinary action for the police officers concerned, has already collected 1.3m signatures.

So far, as a result of our collective voices, the chief justice has directed the DPP to order investigations into the case and set up an inquiry to reinvestigate the matter – we should have the results in early December.

In the meantime, we plan to carry on pushing hard for national police reforms, as well as for the creation of a gender crimes unit to handle sexual violence cases properly. Yes, the impact is slow, especially on matters related to due diligence and state accountability, but this will not stop us from speaking out – and we hope to inspire women and girls to do the same through our work.

Aside from Liz's quest for justice campaign, several other cases are pending in court, and many others have been won, or the victim is still undergoing psychosocial support. For us, just getting a woman or girl to report a violation is itself a big step towards demanding justice.

One memorable example is that of Rosa, who was raped by her mother's boyfriend when she was just one-and-a-half years old. Her uterus was damaged and had to be removed. Rosa's mother sided with her boyfriend and abandoned her daughter. We took up the case brought to us by Rosa's grandmother, and four years later the accused was sentenced to life imprisonment; the highest possible sentence for this crime in Kenya.

Regrettably, Liz and Rosa's cases are symptomatic of a much bigger underlying problem in Kenya – blanket government and perpetrator impunity for violent sexual assaults against women.

Violence against women is the worst manifestation of misogyny and reflects a society that is intolerant of women's integrity and autonomy. Such violence is a result of unequal power relations and the abuse of that power.

We are fighting the entrenched patriarchal systems of structural violence that embody the harmful traditions, common societal beliefs and legal policies – such as female genital mutilation (FGM) and rape in marriage – which normalise abuse and infringe upon women's basic human rights, dignity, safety and security.

For instance, when it comes to domestic violence, Kenya still has no law that recognises partner violence as a crime. It is still addressed as assault with no special attention to the fact that it is a woman's rights violation.

We shall continue to demand that perpetrators are arrested and prosecuted. In a country where the police respond to bank robberies within minutes, it is impossible to imagine that the same police are unable to prosecute Liz's rapists. Rape and other forms of sexual violence are reminders of the kind of phallocratic society we live in; one that celebrates violence, accepts violence, and creates heroes out of violence.

Society places blame and shame on the victims and survivors, making it difficult for those who have been violated to speak out. Women who report rape are often told it is their fault for putting themselves in vulnerable situations. They are stigmatised, treated as outcasts, and sometimes simply sent away by the police when they go to report the crime.

Rape is a scar on modern society that must be removed by ending impunity and changing men's attitudes towards women. Brave survivors of rape are increasingly speaking up and seeking help as awareness of rights increases, but social taboos persist and seeking justice does not always mean that justice is served.

We refuse to be silenced. We shall roar until something is done.

• Saida Ali is executive director of Covaw, a Christian Aid partner