On this day in 2008, the
United Nations Security Council adopted resolution
1820 declaring that rape and other forms of sexual violence could
constitute “a war crime, a crime against humanity, or a constitutive act with
respect to Genocide”. For countries such as Rwanda, which have experienced
conflict and its devastating consequences, this was a major step forward.



The 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi saw over 1,000,000 men, women and children slaughtered in a 100 days. Of those who survived, many endured torture and public humiliation, often in the form of rape and sexual assault. 



Between 250,000 and 500,000 women were systematically raped, with the additional intent to infect them with HIV. The result was, approximately 67 percent diagnosed as HIV+, and an estimated 20,000 children born of these mass rapes. 



READ MORE | <a rel="noreferrer noopener" aria-label="Rwanda’s Gorillas Have Figured Out Where To Find Their Sodium Fix. But It’s Dangerous (opens in a new tab)" href="https://www.forbesafrica.com/focus/2019/04/09/rwandas-gorillas-have-figured-out-where-to-find-their-sodium-fix-but-its-dangerous/" target="_blank">Rwanda’s Gorillas Have Figured Out Where To Find Their Sodium Fix. But It’s Dangerous</a>



Twenty-five years later
Rwandans have worked hard to pick up the pieces, and continue efforts to build a
country its citizens can be proud of. A healthy foundation is now in place, upon
which future generations will stand, to shape an increasingly secure, peaceful
and prosperous nation. Slowly but surely, Rwanda is healing. &nbsp;



For survivors of rape, who in many ways carry a double burden, the journey of healing is more complex, filled with pain that most struggle to keep buried and forgotten. 



Beyond the physical damage they suffered, these women and girls – and in some cases, men and boys – continue to suffer from severe mental wounds that stripped them of their dignity, leaving them feeling like lesser human beings.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">For true healing to occur, we must create and promote a conducive environment where survivors can live dignified lives, unbound by crippling thoughts and the helplessness brought about by their ordeals.</blockquote>



Efforts must be pooled from the highest levels of leadership to the grassroots, to establish safe spaces that allow each victim and survivor of rape to heal, reconnect and reintegrate with the right support and at their own pace.



Even more so, as survivors have to live next to
perpetrators, as many of them remained in their original communities; while the
most notorious, will soon be returning to their homes, after serving their
sentence.



In my experience working
with survivors of rape in Rwanda, I have seen first-hand the miracles that can
occur when survivors’ individual healing journeys are not brushed away, forced
or ridiculed, but simply enabled. 



One particular story stands out in my mind, is that of Suzanne, a woman I met through my work with ABASA, an association of genocide and rape survivors. 



READ MORE | <a rel="noreferrer noopener" aria-label="Young women in Soweto, South Africa, say healthy living is hard. Here’s why (opens in a new tab)" href="https://www.forbesafrica.com/woman/2019/06/07/young-women-in-soweto-south-africa-say-healthy-living-is-hard-heres-why/" target="_blank">Young women in Soweto, South Africa, say healthy living is hard. Here’s why</a>



During the Genocide against
the Tutsi, Suzanne, who was 58 years of age, was raped for several days by militia,
some of whom were her neighbours. Suzanne suffered severe injuries, both
physical and mental. When I first met her, she had no control of her bodily
functions, let alone her life. &nbsp;She had
been in and out of hospitals, with no lasting solution to her medical problems.



My organisation, Imbuto
Foundation, supports the women of ABASA by facilitating their access to HIV
treatment and providing psychosocial and financial support. We ensured that Suzanne
received quality treatment and surgery at a reputable hospital, and stayed
close to her throughout her recovery. As result, she is now a strong and
healthy citizen, whose experience of the Genocide is no longer a physical mark,
left for all to see. 



Every individual story like
Suzanne’s, and that of thousands of Rwandan women raped publicly, and taken to what
was known as ‘Maison des Femmes’ only
to be abused by countless men, underline the vital
importance of recognising rape in conflicts as a weapon of destruction. 



More than that, it is a
call to the international community to:



<ul><li>take bold steps by bringing to justice
those who are still on the run;</li><li>mobilise solidarity, responsibility and
resources to enable the healing and reintegration of rape victims.</li></ul>



For Rwanda, especially during
this Kwibuka (Genocide Commemoration),
a quarter of a century later, it is a call to acknowledge survivors of rape as
true heroines and heroes of our history, and to strip rape of its cruel power.



For all of us, men and women, it is a call to become part of the solution.



READ MORE:



<ul><li><a rel="noreferrer noopener" aria-label="2018 African Of The Year – President of Rwanda Paul Kagame (opens in a new tab)" href="https://www.forbesafrica.com/featured/2018/12/26/2018s-african-of-the-year-president-of-rwanda-paul-kagame/" target="_blank">2018 African Of The Year – President of Rwanda Paul Kagame</a></li><li><a rel="noreferrer noopener" aria-label="Noëlla Coursaris Musunka The Trailblazer In The Congo (opens in a new tab)" href="https://www.forbesafrica.com/woman/2019/03/19/in-pictures-noella-coursaris-musunka-the-trailblazer-in-the-congo/" target="_blank">Noëlla Coursaris Musunka The Trailblazer In The Congo</a></li><li><a rel="noreferrer noopener" aria-label="Ravaged by Ebola and War, Congo Named Most Neglected Crisis of 2018 (opens in a new tab)" href="https://www.forbesafrica.com/current-affairs/2018/12/20/ravaged-by-ebola-and-war-congo-named-most-neglected-crisis-of-2018/" target="_blank">Ravaged by Ebola and War, Congo Named Most Neglected Crisis of 2018</a></li></ul>



&#8211;This is an opinion piece by First Lady of the Republic of Rwanda, Jeannette Kagame, looking at the importance of enabling healing for rape victims and survivors, in line with the anniversary (19 June 2019) of UN Security Council Resolution 1820, recognising rape as a war crime.



<div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="521" height="586" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Rwanda.png.png" alt="" class="wp-image-40881" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Rwanda.png.png 521w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Rwanda.png-300x337.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Rwanda.png-267x300.png 267w" sizes="(max-width: 521px) 100vw, 521px" /><figcaption> First Lady of the Republic of Rwanda, Jeannette Kagame. Picture: Supplied</figcaption></figure></div>

gettyimages-137491727-170667a

Enabling Healing For Rape Survivors

At least 110 women are raped in South Africa. Every day.
There are many similar statistics, all pointing to the same stupefying fact – that South Africa is one of the most dangerous places for girls and women.
This writer too is a survivor of an episode of violence, which – ironically – happened the evening before the country celebrated Women’s Day (August 9) in 2014.
In South Africa, a strong patriarchal mind-set, coupled with the intersection of race, gender, class and other identities, influence gender-based violence. There is also a gross underreporting of such crimes.
In the following pages, two educated young women recount how they didn’t let their own experience of violence get them down.
Samantha Smit* (name changed to protect identity) and Bukelwa Moerane reside 40 kilometers from each other, one in the affluent area of Roodepoort, and the other in Diepsloot, a township in the northern suburbs of Johannesburg. Their paths have never crossed, but destiny served them the same experience from hell – and they survived it.
<h2>Samantha Smit, 28</h2>
In 2013, three days after South Africa celebrated Women’s Day, Smit was drugged and raped by three male friends she had known for seven years. 
When we meet her on a warm Thursday evening in January, the neighborhood is quiet, and her home warm and secure with high security fences. Wearing an oversized t-shirt and jeans, she leads us to the pool area her father helps set up for us. 
Underneath Smit’s warm exterior is the aching heart of a woman still trying to comprehend a disturbing episode in her past. 
“When you read statistics about women who experience violence, whether it’s sexual violence, domestic abuse or interpersonal violence, I would think I was lucky to not have experienced anything before I was 18 years old. And [this state of the country] is a sad reality,” says Smit. 
What was an ordinary night out with friends ended up being her worst nightmare. 
“They asked us to come through to their flat which was nothing strange, because we have all been friends for a long time. We trusted them, we knew them and often went to each other’s houses.” 
They offered her a drink, which she didn’t know was spiked with Liquid E, a date rape drug. 
Fifteen minutes later, she felt dizzy. 
The next thing, they were stripping her in the kitchen and dragging her into the bedroom. 
“The more I put my clothes back on, the more they were taken off. They found it amusing,” she recalls. 
Smit was powerless at the time. 
“It was like a ragdoll effect. I knew it was happening, I didn’t black out, I didn’t lose consciousness. But I wasn’t able to do anything about it. I felt like I was looking into the situation. The next morning, I had a cup of coffee and left,” she tells us. 
She was in denial and did not want the stigma attached to being a victim. 
“I think a part of me knew all along, but did not want to accept it. I also felt like maybe if we don’t give it a name it won’t have the impact… Because at least you still have a little bit of power and it is not completely stripped from you,” she says. 
Her life was never to be the same again. 
“Suddenly I couldn’t stand people touching me. It would suddenly repulse me. I was startled incredibly easily,” she says. 
She suffered post-traumatic stress disorder and checked into a clinic five months after the incident. 
“It’s a difficult thing to admit to yourself… I realized I was spiralling out of control.” 
But she soon reclaimed her power by writing a letter to the three men and confronting them individually. 
Though the scar will never completely heal, counselling, and opening up to other women, has helped. 
“Every woman I opened up to had a similar story to share. That helped me a lot in breaking down the stigma.”
<h2>Bukelwa Moerane, 25</h2>
Moerane has been more vocal about her “near-death experience”. She lost her teeth trying to escape from her abductor in February last year. 
She was on her way home in a taxi one night from Maponya Mall in the township of Soweto. As she stepped out at the Bara taxi rank in Soweto, it was near empty; then out of the blue, a man driving a navy Polo came up from behind and shoved her into his vehicle. 
“What was going through my mind was ‘I don’t know if this guy has a gun behind me or a knife’. He said to me, ‘don’t do anything stupid, you will get hurt’. Instantly, as he said that, my mind stopped working,” shares Moerane. 
The abductor drove off with her, holding on tightly to her wrist. 
“He was swearing at me, and saying ‘I will rape you, I will kill you, don’t even try anything funny’!” 
Moerane started saying her last prayers thinking of her mother and four-year-old daughter. Then, she noticed the door was unlocked. 
“My heart started to beat faster. I started thinking ‘I need to get out, I need to get out, there is something I need to do’,” she says. 
The kidnapper headed down a dark road she knew. 
“I knew if he did something to me in that area, no one was going to find me. I know there are most [probably] thousands of bodies in that area not checked for. I was not going to be one of them,” says Moerane. 
She pretended to be relaxed. 
“I then looked at him, and noticed he was scared as well. His voice was shaking. I think he had gone through something and felt the need to revenge on me.” 
She was no longer frightened. 
“So if this person is scared, why should I be scared? I told myself to calm down and I started calming down, because he was holding on to my right hand at the time,” says Moerane. 
She somehow mustered the courage to jump out of the moving vehicle kicking the door until it opened. 
“He was slapping me and was trying to hold my hand. With the other hand, he was trying to drive and there was oncoming traffic.” 
Her biggest fear was for the kidnapper to grab a weapon and kill her, so she leapt out. She lost two of her front teeth, and was bruised and injured. 
“I could see my skin peeling off, and dark particles. My glasses fell off. While this car was dragging me, I don’t know for how long, I landed with my hands trying to protect my face, but I guess I was too late,” she says. 
Bleeding, she got back up and ran for her life. She tried to stop moving cars, pleading for help, but none did. At the nearest garage, she was taken to Baragwanath Hospital. 
Moerane still fears traveling by herself, but finds solace speaking out. 
She was a participant at the #NotInMyName march last year to the Union Buildings in South Africa’s capital Pretoria sparked by the death of Karabo Mokoena, the young woman allegedly stabbed 27 times by her ex-boyfriend. 
Moerane also took to Twitter to speak out against gender-based violence in the country. She posted images of her after the kidnapping and sought crowdfunding to fix her smile. 
That’s when celebrity dentist Alexander Faizi Rawhani, known as Dr Smile, helped put the smile back on her face. 
“I believe God kept me safe that time and he [the abductor] could do it again. But one thing I know is if he comes back, we go out together. I don’t go out alone. We die together this time,” says Moerane.
Physical violence against women 
• 21% of women over the age of 18 reported they had experienced violence at the hands of a partner. That’s one in five women. 
• Divorced or separated women are more likely to experience physical abuse. 
• The Eastern Cape has the highest rate of physical abuse (a whopping 32% women reporting it).
Sexual violence against women 
• 6% of women over the age of 18 reported they have experienced sexual violence. 
• 16% of divorced or separated women experienced sexual violence by a partner. 
• 10% of women living with a partner reported sexual violence against them. 
• The North West Province reported the highest rate of sexual violence (with 11.8% of women reporting). 
[Source: South Africa Demographic and Health Survey 2016]

Portrait of a Danish woman, 35 years old, with arm and hands up

The Perilous Life Of A Woman In South Africa

With the violence against women assuming epidemic proportions in South Africa in the recent past, and the hashtag #MenAreTrash trending voluminously, it’s heartening learning of small but significant social justice initiatives such as Action Breaks Silence working hard to bring awareness about the culture of rape and violence – and how it can be prevented.
We meet its founder Debi Stevens at a workshop at the Ikaneng Primary School in Soweto, an urban township in Johannesburg, where she bands together young boys and girls and teaches them just that.
“It started a while ago, but the root of the idea was sparked by rape,” says Stevens, herself a victim.
She was 11 years old when she was raped by her friend’s brother. She couldn’t understand what was happening to her, so she decided against telling her parents as she “thought they would divorce”.
Thankfully, she moved from Port Elizabeth to Durban in KwaZulu-Natal, far away from the perpetrator who lived in their neighbourhood. She saw him often and he had been threatening to kill her.
“In high school, I thought of martial arts as self-defence. When a karate club came to my school, I ran to my parents to ask if I can start karate classes. Both my parents said no, because I was a girl.”
<div id="attachment_33219" style="width: 280px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-33219" class=" wp-image-33219" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Debi-Stevens-074-199x300.jpg" alt="" width="270" height="407" />Debi Stevens was herself a victim (Photo by Motlabana Monnakgotla)</div>
Stevens speaks openly about her rape, but now sees herself as a survivor as she did go on to study martial arts. Today, she imparts this learning to young girls, and teaches young boys to respect them.
After the ordeal Stevens went through as a child, karate was her therapy. She was the only female in class, and hit the men so hard she was once asked to leave the club.
“One of the guys showed me his chest, it had my fist mark, I couldn’t believe it, I was so stunned.”
Stevens found healing in sport but soon, there was going to be another tragic turn of events. She was doing well as an athlete when she met an old friend in 1997. This friend, who had been a well-known model in South Africa in the late 1980s, was on drugs and offered them to Stevens.
Oblivious to the impact it would have on her life, she took it, not feeling any pain or emotion the first time. Six months later, she was a chronic addict to crack cocaine. Stevens was only 26 years old.
“People don’t actually realize the journey, sometimes it goes back to a really painful experience that those people are trying to escape. That’s what happened with me,” she says.
Stevens, full of energy, had found another form of escape from the horrific memories of her childhood rape.
Drugs masked her pain and emotion; she was soon selling her belongings to drug dealers.
In 1998, Stevens’ friend died in a car accident, only meters away from one of their drug dealers in Cape Town.
It was then in a fit of emotion that Stevens finally opened up to her mother for the first time about the rape – and the drugs. That was the beginning of her healing process.
“Fast forward the clock, I trained with self-defence instructors all over the world. It took me all this time to learn it so I could be able to pass it on. In my heart, it has always been how to help people that would never be able to pay for my services, that’s why the workshops,” she says.
Stevens has traveled to countries like India and organized the same program for girls and boys there. After each workshop, she sees positive changes in the children.
Thankfully, there are more such examples in Johannesburg of similar initiatives.
International sports brand Reebok partnered with Fight Club Gym for an initiative named Pretty Lethal offering free self-defence lessons for women.
“It was open to any woman who wanted to join. Women who are generally active, women of all races between the ages of 23 and 35 had registered online,” says Brian Jackson, Brand Activation Specialist for Reebok.
“The feedback has been excellent, we’ve managed to get exposure through various agencies and publications, it has been very positive because no one else has done this – an initiative to empower women.”
Phase two of Pretty Lethal will be launching in Cape Town during Women’s Month consisting of three classes of 50 women each. The fight must go on.

Fight Like A Girl

He was a familiar face in her neighbor-hood who offered her a ride one day.
But as the little car drove past her stop, where she was to get off, and sped on to the freeway and into inner city Johannesburg, she knew there was danger ahead.
“From that moment, I just felt something was not right. He wasn’t touching me, he wasn’t doing anything but I just knew it,” says Nkuli Bogopa, opening up about the day she was raped at the age of 19 by a man she knew in a part of town she was afraid of. The darkness of that day seems light years away, visibly conflicting with the cheerful woman she is today in the brightly-colored room where we meet.
Bogopa is a woman of the new South African middle class, with a tertiary degree, a great job and a family. She is not the common face of rape in this country. Yet, we can only blame popular perceptions of rape for this.
Shortly before the interview, Bogopa was the one asking the questions: “what kind of women have you reached out to?”, “where are they from?”, and “what did they do?”.
It was easy to understand her concern: rape survivors are not an analogous demographic. They are separate people, from discrete communities and backgrounds. They were brought up in different ways and believe in different things.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-medium wp-image-29661 alignleft" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/shutterstock_184280369-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/shutterstock_184280369-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/shutterstock_184280369-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/shutterstock_184280369-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/shutterstock_184280369-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/shutterstock_184280369.jpg 1023w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
The violation of their bodies, and in some cases, hopes, is the single thing that unites them. In many cases, it changes them completely. The person who emerges from a sexual assault can never be the same again. At the same time, the people and the world around the victim change. American writer and lecturer on psychology and politics, Andrew Solomon, says it best.
“Historically, rape has been seen less as a violation of a woman than as a theft from a man to whom that woman belonged, either her husband or her father, who suffered an economic loss (a woman’s marriageability spoiled) and an insult to his honor.”
Fear And Shame
In South Africa, signs of this quiet paternalistic culture are clear. This can explain, partly, the culture of fear and shame that surrounds reporting a rape or seeking justice.
Perhaps a popular example of this is the 2006 rape trial of a prominent South African politician, who in his 60s, was accused of raping a 31-year-old woman, related to him through a family friendship. At the end of a two-month trial, the politician was acquitted.
The brutal gang rape and disembowelment of Western Cape teen, Anene Booysen in 2013 was another famous case that rocked South Africa. Weeks earlier, there had been fury in India after a young woman in New Delhi was killed in a similar, hideous crime, and a furious South Africa realized it too was confronting a tide of sexual violence.
&nbsp;
Is There Justice?
The nation has not completely failed its women, children and sexually-vulnerable citizens. In 2007, the laws governing rape changed. Definitions were broadened to include both male and female victims as well as a range of sexual violations that constitute an offense.
Even the nature of the law changed. Rape is no longer governed by common law which relies heavily on the court’s prior decisions. Legislation is now in place which elevates rape to a statutory offense.
Signs of change have been celebrated by prosecutors.
In 2007, the year the new sexual offenses act came into operation, over 52,000 rape and other sexual crimes were reported to police and relevant authorities. However, in the course of gathering evidence, 60% of these cases were abandoned. Eventually, only 2,105 cases secured conviction which is only 4% of all cases reported that year.
Seven years later, the figures are much healthier. This year, more than 62,000 victims came forward, over half them were specifically rape complaints. It was a bumper crop for convictions, the highest in recent history, at 67%.
However, if you look at actual statistics, you’ll notice a major shortfall. The conviction rate corresponds to cases that ended up going to trial. So in reality, of the cases reported this year, only 8,174 went to court and only 5,484 cases secured convictions. It illustrates that sexual violence in South Africa is still an issue that needs to be addressed.
&nbsp;
The Third Witness
There are adverse circumstances responsible for this.
Cases are often withdrawn due to lack of evidence. The J88 form, known in courtrooms as the ‘third witness’, is a form filled after a sexual offense is reported. It records medical evidence on the victim and determines whether a rape occurred. Often, injuries are relied upon as signs of violation. In many cases, the information is vague or the examination is rushed. Advocates routinely argue for these reports to be made inadmissible during trial, eliminating the only tangible evidence of a rape outside of witness testimonies.
In some cases, rape dockets detailing the original complaint, disappear without explanation. In some areas, there is allegedly an ‘unofficial’ price list to make them disappear.
Mara Glennie, founder of Tears Foundation, a referral service for victims of sexual crimes, says this might be true in certain parts of the country.
“I do believe that [this] does happen. There are areas in our country that have a high incidence of gangsterism where this can occur.”
Without a docket recording an offense, a case cannot proceed to trial.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-medium wp-image-29660 alignleft" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/shutterstock_91193030-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/shutterstock_91193030-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/shutterstock_91193030-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/shutterstock_91193030-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/shutterstock_91193030-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/shutterstock_91193030.jpg 1023w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
Other reasons leading to the low number of cases that go to court have to do with criminal procedure. Investigators assigned to a case can be spread too thin so they may not follow up the complaint, or they report the victim or accused missing. If either one is missing, or cannot be found due to address informalities common in townships and rural areas, a case cannot go to trial.
But perhaps the greatest hurdle to having a case go to court happens at the point of reporting it. Glennie was herself a victim of sexual and violent abuse. She remembers her visit to the police station.
“I went to my local police station with black eyes and limping. I asked if I could lay a charge of abuse.”
It was a Friday and when she got to the station she was asked to return on Monday because the responsible officer was not around.
“Quite often you have unsympathetic people, generally-speaking, people who don’t want to help. It’s a messy procedure,” she says.
However, there may be a reason behind the lethargy at police stations. The South African Police Service has targets to meet and is expected to reduce violent crime by at least 4% each year. This serves as a major disincentive for officers to ensure that reported rape cases reach investigators and prosecutors.
&nbsp;
‘Jackrolling’
But victims themselves are slow to report crimes because of fear. In a majority of cases, the offenders are known to them, as Bogopa’s story shows. Far beyond intimidation, women who have been raped may be slow to speak because of cultural taboos.
“No one wants to say they’ve been abused by their partner, people may not want to date a rape victim. Also, there are negative financial consequences, the person that hurt you might be the breadwinner,” says Glennie.
But beyond the structures that victims can appeal to, the context in which they live is at odds with itself. South Africa is a historically conservative country grappling with the progressive laws that now govern it. The prevalence of rape and other violent crime has often been blamed on a crippling culture of violence that began during colonial rule and continued past the end of apartheid.
The legacy of the country’s past has encouraged violence in certain parts of the country. Former segregationist policies left townships unpoliced in some instances. Gangs and criminal groups in townships flourished during this time.
In Soweto, the Jack Roller gang, a youth gang prominent in the 1980s, were specialists in abducting and raping women in townships.
Their legacy continues with ‘jackrolling’ as the common street term for recreationally raping women in this way. It is clear that to alleviate the sexual crime endemic in South Africa, the mindsets of perpetrators have to change.
Back in Bogopa’s colorful office, she talks about a project she is working on.
“For as long as women are the only people talking about this issue, it’s never going to change. Our jails are full of men, our street corners are full of men, a majority of our crime is committed by men. Women are on the receiving end, men are on the other side. We need to invest more time in the boy child, we need to build better men.”
So this has become her crusade, she founded an organization that routinely brings young men together to freely discuss the “the issues of life”. Bogopa is working with a small group of young men which she hopes to grow to 2,050 annually.
“I want the message to be as broad-based as possible,” she says.
In a country known to be an international rape capital, cultural and historical problems run deep. The South African Medical Council has noted that only one in nine rape victims make it to the police station to report the crime implying the reported figures may be much higher.
Even as more and more rapes are recorded and conviction rates rise, the problems within and around sexual violence in the Republic hint at a quiet crisis where the nation’s constitutional ideals are misaligned with the attitudes of its public.

Tag: Rape

FORBES AFRICA SOCIAL MEDIA

Enabling Healing For Rape Survivors

The Perilous Life Of A Woman In South Africa

Fight Like A Girl

Rape