Nkoana-Mashabane: ‘More than 30 women slaughtered in June’
Minister in the Presidency for Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities Maite Nkoana-Mashabane has revealed that more than 30 women have fallen victim to gender-based violence (GBV) in June alone.
She took part in a parliamentary debate on the scourge on Tuesday.
Nkoana-Mashabane said she’s tired of the lack of action against perpetrators of the gruesome crimes against women and children.
“This issue that has been debated so much. So many mothers, daughters, grandmothers, children that we’ve lost makes us to really feel ashamed. I’m also tired of this debate.
“In this June, in the middle of a pandemic that has ravaged the entire globe, South African women felt triply short-changed again by poverty, unemployment and by being women, by the pandemic which already found them already being slaughtered like sheep.”
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Nkoana-Mashabane said while government has made headway in dealing with the scourge of GBV, the system can still do more to hold perpetrators accountable.
“It should be the last time we sit here in Parliament and hear of how a raped woman must walk, between her legs, protecting the semen of her molester until the next day.”
Several high-profile cases have come to light since the easing of lockdown regulations.
Earlier this week, 28-year-old Tshegofasto Pule died after she was stabbed and found hanging from a tree in Roodepoort.
The incident sent shock waves across the country.
Nkoana-Mashabane says government will continue to run campaigns to call for an end to the crisis.
“Women in South Africa are under siege and this must change.”