GBV Relief Program

South africa is prevalent with Gender Based Violence (GBV). In this paper we mean Gender Based Violence to be and include : physical, sexual, emotional, and psychological violence and abuse. This has been an ongoing social issue which has seen a rise (over 55% by partners in relationships) in the last couple of years.

With the pandemic we have just experienced (covid-19), the GBV cases have risen significantly and have become more visible with the brutal murders. Many of the affected women, according to statistics, have children to care for. This, a lack of a source of income, fear and a lack of a place to go, causes these women to stay and stand for the abuse.

The victims see no way out, do not receive assistance from local authorities and family, which again makes it difficult to escape the violent domestic situation which they are faced with. Cultural believes also play a major role in the occurence of violence as well as action or lack thereof when it does occur. (See 1. and 2. Chart, Statistics SA June 2018)

1. Chart showing percentage of people who think it is acceptable to hit women based on race and gender.

2.

Research shows that the two weeks after escape are the most dangerous for domestic abuse victims. With nowhere to go and no assistance, they end up in places where the perpetrators can easily find them and kill them. Murder is almost always the end result of these cases as the violence tends to escalate after each incident, and even more so with reporting and escaping. The numbers are known to be high from news reports which have led to protests, the public databases, however, fall short on fully capturing the data with regards to women and gender based violence. The latest report found is from 2018 and it hardly focuses on women and gender based violence.

The psychological damage is as bad as the physical damage. Without the proper care and counseling the victims of abuse tend to find themselves in the same cycle, not only that, but they end up causing the cycle to reoccur with their offspring. Aside from the aforementioned, the victims of abuse report incidents less and less, go back to the perpetrators, defend the perpetrators and do what they think is best, which tends to be what is not best for themselves or their offspring.

The aim of this company is to provide shelter, food, income and safety to these women and their offspring. Shelter will be provided to ensure that they have somewhere to go once they escape their grave violent situations. Somewhere away and unbeknownst to their abusers. Food will be provided to the women and their offspring as this is a basic need.

The women will also be put to work for a sustainable organisation and income, for their independence, so they are able to provide for themselves and their children, so they have a secure and consistent source of income, so they gain skills to be able to build themselves back up, restart their lives and be able to get back on their feet. Safety and anonymity will be provided to ensure that they are safe from their abusers.

We will also provide graduates with the experience they need by allowing them to come in and provide services to the survivors in the organisation. We provide job opportunities to locals in different communities and also train them and give them skills so that thay too can be empowered while giving back to their communities. While doing so, they will also be identifying victims of gender based/domestic violence who wish to find a place of safety after they escape and/or need tools to sustain them before they escape.

The graph below shows the percentage of places of safety which households know about by gender of the household head. Not knowing of a place to go is a major setback in the victims being able to get out of a domestic violence situation.

3.