By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
President Cyril Ramaphosa has called on men to lead efforts to fight Gender-Based violence as they are the primary perpetrators of the scourge.
Ramaphosa gave the keynote address at the 17th Biennial Conference of the International Association of Women Judges in Cape Town.
Judges from across the world are currently meeting at the biennial conference of the IAWJ underway in Cape Town.
In 2022, South Africa amended three laws to strengthen its response to gender-based violence.
“Men should be in the forefront of the struggle because it is us as men who violate women,” Ramaphosa said.
“So, in many ways, we must lead the struggle against gender-based violence.”
Even though there’s been decrease in various serious crimes, including a 9.8% reduction in murders, a 3.3% drop in rape incidents, and a 3.2% decline in attempted sexual offences, as revealed in the Third Quarter Crime Statistics for 2023/2024, women and children still continue to fall victims of GBV in the country.
Ramaphosa said this year marks the 30th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, which encourages signatories to domesticate its principles, commitments, and goals, and translate them into concrete national actions.
He said South Africa, like many of the countries represented in the IAWJ, is a signatory to the declaration.
“The impact of this landmark document has been profound and far-reaching in shaping our country’s policies and practices around gender equality,” he said.
“We understood that gender-based violence affects women and girls, and that the impacts of GBV are profound, including physical injury, long-term mental health problems, and even death.”
Ramaphosa said that survivors of such crimes were still too often having to endure the negative impact of standing up for themselves.
He said that the right to a fair trial should not only apply to the accused.
“It should also apply to the fair treatment of survivors of gender-based violence and they should not be subject to bias and victim blaming as well.”
Ramaphosa said that the strength of the justice system would also foster greater confidence in reporting such crimes.
Women judges, he added, also had the power to reshape how the law was interpreted.
Ramaphosa said that women judges could also be a catalyst for change, through their lived experiences and the realities behind the cases they adjudicate.