Ramaphosa promises national address on gender-based violence within days

President Cyril Ramaphosa has committed to a national address on gender-based violence within days, telling the country’s official Heritage Day gathering in Oudtshoorn that he would set out the government’s response and report back on investigations into the recent killings of women.

As IOL reported on 24 September, Ramaphosa used his keynote address at the 2026 National Heritage Day celebrations to pledge decisive action on gender-based violence, saying: “In a few days, I will address the nation on the steps the government is taking to confront gender-based violence and provide an update on the investigation into the killings of women.”

That commitment is the news. The rest of the speech was a Heritage Day address, delivered under the theme “Celebrating Our Living Heritage: Strengthening the Ties That Bind Us”, and it ranged across culture, history and memory.

The timing is what gives the pledge its weight. The speech followed weeks in which, according to IOL, more than 10 women were reported as victims of violent attacks in Ekurhuleni and in other parts of the country. Those reports are the immediate backdrop to the president’s undertaking, and they are why a scheduled national address matters more than a line in a celebratory speech normally would.

For a South African reader, the value of that address will lie in its specifics. Gender-based violence sits across several institutions at once: the South African Police Service, which registers and investigates the cases, the National Prosecuting Authority, which decides whether they reach court, and the courts themselves. The country’s network of Thuthuzela Care Centres, which provide medical and counselling support to survivors and are run with the National Prosecuting Authority, is where much of the practical response is felt. Whether a national address changes anything depends on whether it names the police stations, the case backlogs and the units involved, and whether it reports on the investigations it has promised to update.

Ramaphosa did not give a date for the address beyond “a few days”. He did not name the women whose deaths are under investigation, nor the police units handling those cases. Those details, if they come, will come in the address itself.

The Heritage Day speech also placed the country’s cultural inheritance at its centre. Ramaphosa paid tribute to the Khoi and San as the original custodians of the land and its narratives, and recognised the country’s Living Human Treasures, among them traditional practitioners, storytellers, musicians, healers, craftspeople and knowledge holders.

He honoured the Northern Cape and the Southern Cape, saying the region bears testimony to a history of struggle in both the coloured and black communities under the banner of the United Democratic Front, and singled out the political legacies of the people of Bongolethu and Bridgton. He also pledged support for the preservation of natural heritage through the National Greening Campaign.

And he returned to the country’s past, saying: “We must remember apartheid. We must remember forced removals. We must remember the humiliation of people who were told that they could not live where they chose, work where they chose, love whom they chose, or even enter through the same door as another South African, because of the colour of their skin.”

Oudtshoorn, in the Little Karoo, hosted the national event, with the Minister of Sports, Arts and Culture among the leaders present.

Source: IOL, Ramaphosa promises update on GBV response in Heritage Day speech.