South African President Cyril Ramaphosa will speak on the country’s gender-based violence and femicide crisis.
The announcement will be made at the end of a renewed concern about the murder of women, particularly in Ekurhuleni, where the bodies of 11 women have been found over the past two months. Ramaphosa will speak about government measures to address this gender-based violence and femicide (GBVF).
He will also talk about the investigation into the murders of women in and around Ekurhuleni. In July, Ramaphosa appointed a national council to give strategic leadership on efforts to eliminate GBVF.
This was after the government declared gender-based violence a national disaster last year. However, the declaration did not lead to additional government funding to address the crisis.
Last week, the Department of Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities said this was because they did not know how much money individual government departments had allocated to the problem from their budgets following the declaration.
The president’s address is therefore expected to be highly scrutinized, as authorities face mounting pressure to show how government measures are being implemented in the face of an ongoing crisis.
The developments in Ekurhuleni have intensified the concern about the scale of violence against women and the impact of measures taken to prevent such crimes.
