Chairperson, the eve of another 16 days of activism for no violence against women and children allows us as parliamentarians to step back and take a sober look at how we, as a nation, are best protecting our children and women and how seriously we take our responsibilities as members of Parliament and the executive.
According to the annual report of SAPS, the number of children murdered in the last financial year increased to 1 410. This is a massive 22,4% increase from the previous year. There were 1 488 attempted murders on children, and that is an increase of 14%. I want you to think about it for a while: 1 410 children murdered in one year. That is nearly one child every six hours in our country.
How are these children being murdered? Obviously we need to know this if we are to understand the causes of this scourge. For the past two years, however, the current Minister - who is talking and not listening - and the previous Ministers of Safety and Security have refused to answer the parliamentary questions I put to them, despite the information being readily available on the SAPS computer system.
Now, if Ministers are not prepared to answer a legitimate question with regard to how children are being murdered, it tells me they are not serious about violence against children. And, given the attention the Minister is giving to the debate today, it is quite clear that he doesn't care about violence against children.
The reason I know the information is available on the SAPS computer system, is that in 2006 the previous Minister actually did answer the question on what weapons were used to murder children. You, sir, have refused to answer that question. The reply sent shivers down my spine.
As expected, firearms and knives are two of the biggest categories with regard to instruments being used to murder children, and were responsible for 54% of all murders. The third biggest category was unknown. The cause of 18% of all child murders was never identified in our country. Surely an autopsy would have determined what was used to kill a child? Does this indicate that simple autopsies are not being conducted on all murdered children?
It is no wonder that the conviction rate for the murder of children is a dismal 12,8%, which means 87% of all murderers actually get away with it. The other means used to murder children highlight the disgusting depths which we as a nation have stooped to. Our children are murdered by being strangled, according to the reply on 2006; 26 children were kicked to death - can you imagine the pain and fear those children went through; stabbed with bottles and screwdrivers; being stoned with bricks; being set alight with matches; six children were murdered with axes; another six were murdered with fists - so they were punched to death basically; three children were murdered by having boiling water poured all over them; and hammers were also used. And so the list goes on.
How sick is our society when a child can be used as a punching bag? What this does indicate is that we are failing to protect our children before they are hurt or murdered. Where are our social services which are supposed to identify vulnerable children and, if necessary, remove them from potentially dangerous situations? Early intervention is critical for all those involved in child protection services, including social services and schools.
It is also important to have accountability when things go wrong, to ensure that questions can be asked about why people did not act quickly enough. We also need to hold the Ministers accountable with regard to the lack of information coming from their departments.
With a 22% increase in child murders in one year, it is startlingly clear that the very agencies that should be protecting our children are simply not working. Another way we have failed our children is by scrapping the independent, specialised Family Violence, Child Protection and Sexual Offences units, FCS units, who dealt with over 47 000 cases of rape and grievous bodily harm last year alone. By doing what they did, the ANC have eroded centres of excellence, resulting in a system that is considerably less child-friendly than the previous system.
Children are now expected to go to police stations to report crimes. This is an intimidating environment, and the vast majority of police stations do not have facilities for children, such as playrooms and observation rooms, which many of the FCS units did have. What is needed is less talk and some action from government. Protection services are failing to intervene in thousands of cases across the country. The figures speak for themselves. We are failing our children and no amount of public relations exercises will change that.
The DA is therefore calling on government to establish an independent inquiry into the running of all child protection services in order to determine how best we can harness our current resources and to determine what is needed to resource our agencies better. Clearly, with 1 410 murders a year, the system is not working. We also need to restore the FCS units as independent, specialised units away from police stations and with facilities for children, because we need to put the children first and the system must be developed around children and not around politicians and policemen. I thank you very much. [Applause.]