Advocacy groups demand more from government to fight GBV scourge in SA

IOL News

11 hours ago

Advocacy groups believe stronger action needs to be taken to end GBV.
Image: File
As South Africa commemorates Youth Month, the terror of gender-based violence and femicide (GBVF) looms large over the country as countless women and children fall victim to unthinkable crimes on a daily basis.
The government has made noise around this scourge; yet, the number of murders, rape and kidnapping cases continues to rise. Women's rights advocacy groups and activists have continued to call for the government to step up and protect all of its citizens.
Siyabulela Monakali, the communications manager for Ilitha Labantu, a non-profit organisation founded in 1989 in Gugulethu, in the Western Cape said that the government has failed in addressing GBVF.
"Despite declaring GBVF a national crisis and rolling out progressive legal frameworks, the harsh reality tells a very different story. Between January and March 2025 alone, 966 women and 314 children were murdered. These are not mere statistics; they represent lives lost amid a system that too often fails to protect the most vulnerable," said Monakali.
Chronic underfunding of programmes, inadequate enforcement of existing laws, a lack of political will, and an overburdened legal system have retraumatised survivors and made justice elusive according to Monakali.
A peaceful protest held Vhembe District, Limpopo Province to bring attention to GBV matters
Image: SAPS
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"The government's response remains reactive rather than proactive, marked by bursts of noise, marches, and declarations that quickly fade into short-term memory, only for new tragedies to emerge," he added.
"Many of the government's interventions are mere band-aids, failing to confront the deeper, systemic issues of misogyny, toxic masculinity, and entrenched gender inequality that fuel GBVF. Until there is meaningful, coordinated, and well-resourced action that tackles these root causes, the crisis will continue unabated."
Monakali went on to say that the legal system also fails women and children despite the presence of regulatory frameworks to fight GBVF. So, the country finds itself in a paradoxical scenario where the high prevalence rate of GBVF remains with a consistently low conviction rate.
For Women For Change, the government's failure of addressing GBVF is due to not prioritising the issue. The organisation created a petition for the government to declare GBVF a national disaster.
"Government's bureaucracy and their lack of accountability, transparency, and responsiveness to the scourge of GBVF is one of the key reasons why more women will be killed in this country," said the advocacy group. "We urge the State that the Constitution places an obligation on them to respect, protect, promote, and fulfil the rights in the Bill of Rights and we expect the State to act decisively and with intent to eradicate GBVF."
Woman For Change highlighted that South Africa's Constitution provides many protections against GBVF.
These include the right to equality (section 9), which encompasses equality before the law and equal protection and benefit under the law for everyone, as well as the prohibition of unjust discrimination by the State and people on a variety of grounds, including gender.
Section 10 of the Constitution provides the right to human dignity, whilst Section 11 ensures the right to life. Importantly, Section 12 of the Constitution provides the right to personal liberty and security, which includes the right of everyone to be free from all types of physical violence.
"Despite progressive developments, incidences of GBVF in South Africa remain extremely high due to the failures in the criminal justice system. To protect the dignity and freedom of women and children, government departments can no longer fail to prioritise GBVF policies and programmes to eradicate GBVF."
Activist Mukhethwa Dzhugudzha expressed similar belief to the groups, claiming that the government only steps in after a woman has been raped or murdered.
"We need to shift to preventative measures," he added. "Young women and children are still unsafe because the government focuses on punishment rather than protection. Until we address root causes of GBVF such as economic dependency, policing and victim blaming, we will continue to fail the people we claim to protect."
"The rise in the country's violent cases against women is an indictment on all of us that our society is exposed to GBVF, sexual violence, murder and assault in such alarming numbers.
"We need to redouble our efforts in ensuring the effective implementation of the National Strategic Plan on GBVF which provides a useful pathway out of this crisis," added Bafana Khumalo of Sonke Gender Justice.
The advocacy group said it maintains zero tolerance on all forms of violence against women and girls and joins the globe to raise awareness on the scourge of violence and calls for substantive actions by leaders to end these crimes.