KwaThema men walk against gender-based violence after nine women are found killed in Ekurhuleni
The men-led solidarity march, organised by the Gauteng Department of Community Safety, followed the discovery of nine women's bodies dumped across the city.
Men and women from KwaThema in Ekurhuleni walked through the township on Friday to speak out against gender-based violence and femicide, after nine women were found killed and dumped in various parts of the city.
As SABC News reported on 25 September, the solidarity walk was organised by the Gauteng Department of Community Safety and carried the theme “men leading a united stand against Gender Based Violence and Femicide”. Residents who joined the march said the killings could not be allowed to continue.
The choice of a men-led walk is deliberate. Gender-based violence in South Africa is overwhelmingly committed by men, and the department’s framing puts the responsibility for stopping it on the men in the community rather than on the women who live with the threat of it. That is the argument the marchers were making on the street.
Nine women found dead and dumped across one metro area is the kind of figure that stops a community. Each of those deaths is a police case, and each will move through the criminal justice system at its own pace. The walk on Friday was the community’s answer to that, in public, on foot.
For residents of KwaThema and the wider East Rand, the practical questions are the ones that follow every such march. Whether the cases are investigated properly, whether arrests follow, and whether the courts move. The Department of Community Safety’s involvement puts a provincial government foot in the street, but the policing and prosecution belong to the South African Police Service and the National Prosecuting Authority.
Any person with information about the killings can contact the SAPS on 10111 or use the Crime Stop line on 08600 10111. Gender-based violence survivors can reach the national command centre on 0800 428 428, or use the GBV Command Centre’s Please Call Me service on 1207867#.
Source: SABC News, Some women and men around Kwa Thema in Ekurhuleni come out to walk against Gender Based Violence
