‘A relentless war waged on women and children’

THE harrowing gender-based violence statics paints a bleak picture of a country at war with it most vulnerable citizens.

Each year South Africa observes 16 Days of Activism for No Violence Against Women and Children, a global campaign . But activists have called for less talk and more action.

Last week national Police Minister Bheki Cele, released the latest crime statistics for July and September, which included 9556 rapes cases, a 7% increase from the previous statistics and 13 000 cases of domestic violence.

Provincial figures show in the first nine months of the year, 125 children were murdered.

Two years ago President Cyril Ramaphosa promised R1.1 billion would be used in the fight against gender-based violence and femicide.

But gender-based activists want to know what happened to this money.

Lucinda Evans, founding member of the project Philisa Abafazi Bethu Women Centre, said this was one of the many reasons why she has little faith in the country’s number one citizen.

“Ask the president what happened

to the money? How many organisations on the Cape Flats benefited from this fund?”

She said justice was slow for many murdered women, like the trial of 19-year-old Jesse Hess which has been postponed to next year. The UWC student was killed in 2019.

Evans told the Weekend Argus that she has tried to report a situation she personally has found herself in.

“I’ve been getting creepy calls late at night from a number I didn't know. This person would just breathe and say nothing.

“This went on for a month until I went to the police station. But I was told that they couldn't do anything because I only have a number and no location.

“I then decided to do my own investigation and tracked him down. I found that this guy has been targeting women who work with GBV prevention.

“This is why I want to also challenge the president to come and sit down, talk to me, account to me, why are we still struggling?”

Evans said the president must prioritise the true pandemic of the country.

“He has far less control on the GBV pandemic; he uses GBV as a political ping pong when this is our reality here.

“He is the secondary alleged perpetrator of the atrocities to women happening in this country.”

Fellow activist Bronwyn Litkie, founder of SA Women Fight Back, shares Evan’s sentiments. She said these campaigns mean little to the woman who will die at the hands of her partner tonight.

“Every 16 days, everyone wears black, the government quotes statistics and talks about how they going to change GBV, yet we don't see any change.”

She said the GBV fund was created and promises were made. “We all sent in our forms, we all got a response saying they will get back to us, we have heard nothing more. Petitions that we

sent two years ago asking President Ramaphosa to stick to the promises he made, we got zero response.”

Litkie said that women were tired of the government using the 16 Days of Activism campaign to say that they were working on the scourge, when the job to protect women and children is a 365 day job.

“The truth is, we honestly need all the help we can get, but we just never receive it ... unfortunately.”

Advocate Bernadine Bachar, director at the Saartjie Baartman Centre for Women and Children and chairperson of the Western Cape Women’s Shelter Movement, agreed with her colleagues and said unfortunately not much has changed for women and girls in South

Africa when it comes to being subjected to violence.

Bachar who is also the executive committee member for the National Shelter Movement, said the plight has actually worsened.

In his weekly blog From the Desk of the President, President Ramaphosa has admitted that the statistics are shameful. “We are in the grip of a relentless war being waged on women and children that, despite our best efforts, shows no signs of abating.

He has said violence perpetrated by men against women is the second pandemic that the country must confront, and “like the Covid-19 pandemic it can be overcome if we all work together”.