Hon Minister, while I appreciate the efforts that your department have put forward to fight this calamity of killing our children and women, I want to emphasise that we still have room to do more, but we need to work together. I want to say, madam, this issue of gender-based violence is a very sensitive issue and we can't treat it anyhow. We have seen so many plans that government put forward. I can tell you that the plans were put forward before I even had grey hair.
IsiZulu:
Kodwa ngigugile manje, ngakhoke bengifuna ukuthi-ke ma, ngicela leli cebo ulibukele eduze ngoba ...
English:
... it is a hope of those who are affected because of this gender- based violence.
IsiZulu:
Owakho umsebenzi ukulibukela eduze. Okwesibili, bengingafisa Ngqonqoshe ukuthi uthi fahla fahla ngokuthi leli-cebo uzokwenza kanjani ukuthi lingagcini selixhashazwa, ligcina seliyindawo lapho abantu bezicebisa khona ngalo ngoba kunabantu abasemakhaya abahluphekile abafisa ukulibona lisebenza futhi lisebenza kubo ngqo. Ngiyathokoza Ngqongqoshe.
English:
The DEPUTY MINISTER IN THE PRESIDENCY FOR WOMEN, YOUTH AND PERSONS
WITH DISABILITIES: Hon Chairperson and hon members, I really fully agree with the hon member about the seriousness of the scourge of the killing of women and children in our country. Also, the hon member is raising something which we are all reflecting upon in terms of saying, if you look at when the Domestic Violence Act was passed and why it has not been effective, looking at our Constitution which is the best and why the rights of women, girls and children were not protected based on just that, and so many commitments we have made - the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child - it is a big question mark. But then, what we are trying to do is to really not look much at what didn't work yesterday. The question is to move faster in terms of new possibilities.
Hon members will remember that there was a time when women would go to a local police station and the police there would not even apprehend the man if the man was threatening the wife. They would think that there was something wrong with you culturally. How do you report your own husband? So, we come from that difficult history developmentally, where we couldn't even separate the rights and say, we could not affirm culture where people's rights were violated, and it took almost a decade. Civil society organisations were raising this issue continuously and saying, we did go to the police station but the police would not even come. Instead, they would counsel you and show you that something was not right. But - I think - we have come a long way.
That's why I said maybe we need to move forward now that there has been a clear message that police stations must now be experienced by women as environments conducive for opening cases which must be accurately recorded; and files sent accurately to relevant magistrate offices so that we, the people of South Africa, begin to see the criminal justice system differently.
Even our Thuthuzela Centres ... we come from an era where sometimes, when you go to a centre, you'd see that there was supposed to be a social worker, but maybe the social worker was not there. So, the
resources were inadequate. But where we are today, with regard to the last part of the question, I am glad that we are talking about this when government has put all sorts of mechanisms against corruption.
We will look at the proposal of the national Interim Steering Committee on Gender-based Violence and Femicide and see what they propose in the national strategic plan. But people are hoping that it is not going to be an investment in people's jobs and utilising resources on employing more people. Hopefully, it will be a secretariat that will just monitor that the work is being done properly and timeously with success. Of course, there are all sorts of systems that have been put in place against any form of corruption in government. There'll also be vigilance in terms of ensuring that the resources go towards enabling the survivors rather than many more people who might benefit without really contributing directly to survivors of these crimes.
So, we are all together in saying, enough is enough; and it cannot be business as usual. We have to do things differently and there is that commitment from all of us who are involved that, how we acted yesterday, won't work today if we want drastic results.
The President has even put more pressure by talking about the national crisis that calls for emergency measures and not what one can do under normal circumstances.