Ramaphosa declares national shame on Ekurhuleni’s women mass killings

Ramaphosa declares national shame as Ekurhuleni becomes killing field for women

By Lovemore Lubinda

JOHANNESBURG – President Cyril Ramaphosa has admitted that South Africa has failed women and that what the state has done so far is not enough, as fury grows over the slaughter of women in Ekurhuleni.

Addressing the nation on Tuesday night from the Union Buildings, Ramaphosa said the country is gripped by anger and national shame after 11 women’s bodies were found dumped in and around the City of Ekurhuleni since July. The latest victim was discovered on Sunday in Springs.

“The nation is angry. The women of South Africa are angry. Their anger is justified. I share that anger,” Ramaphosa said. “The violence inflicted upon the women of South Africa is a source of profound pain and national shame.”

In an unusually aggressive and emotional address, Ramaphosa named the victims whose bodies have been identified — Busisiwe Mahlangu, Itumeleng Kekana, Nomfesane Mjobo, Gracious Nkomo, Elizabeth Moselakgomo, Dineo Motapane, Jabulile Ntimba and Ntombifuthi Nxumalo — and listed more women and girls murdered across the country in recent weeks, including 10-year-old Octavia Swarts, 73-year-old grandmother Mariette Mouton, and 15-year-old Amogelang Motshwaedi.

“There are women lying tonight in government mortuaries waiting to be identified, waiting for someone to claim them, waiting to be taken home and laid to rest,” he said. “Behind each of these terrible deaths was a human being whose life had value.”

Ramaphosa said police have made arrests in some of the cases — four suspects are in custody and one suspect killed himself as police closed in — but warned against assumptions of a single serial killer. He said investigations have been elevated to national level under the Deputy National Commissioner for Detective Services, bringing together detectives, Crime Intelligence, forensic specialists, investigative psychologists and digital investigators. The CSIR is assisting with DNA and cellphone data analysis.

Confronting his own government, Ramaphosa ordered four immediate, time-bound interventions, saying failures of the state cannot continue to cost women’s lives.

1. National case-recovery operation: Police, Justice and the NPA must within 60 days audit all unresolved murders, attempted murders and rapes involving women and children, and within 90 days produce a recovery plan for each stalled case with a responsible official and deadline. “These cases will not be allowed to go cold,” he said.

2. Forensic backlog blitz: Within 60 days, a funded plan to clear forensic backlogs and ring-fence priority GBVF samples for urgent processing, with public quarterly reporting on turnaround times.

3. Women’s safety audits: Every municipality, within 60 days, must audit broken streetlights, abandoned buildings, overgrown public spaces, unsafe taxi ranks and transport routes that make women targets, and fix urgent hazards within 90 days.

4. War on alcohol-fuelled violence: A joint legislative package by Trade and Industry, Health, Social Development, Police and Cooperative Governance to be tabled to Cabinet within 60 days to tighten alcohol regulation and enforcement.

In his strongest rebuke to men, Ramaphosa said South Africa cannot police its way out of femicide and that the burden has been wrongly placed on women to protect themselves.

“We have placed the burden of male violence on women. That must change,” he said. “Women should not have to live in fear because government has failed to repair a light, clear a public space, process evidence or enforce a law.”

He called on men and boys to confront abusers directly: “Challenge the friend who humiliates his partner. Challenge the colleague who harasses women. Challenge the relative who abuses his wife.”

“What weighs on me most is that seven years ago, in this same month, I stood before the nation to speak about this same crisis,” Ramaphosa said, referencing his 2019 address after the murder of Uyinene Mrwetyana. “What we have done has not been enough. We need to do much more.”

He said Finance Minister will announce additional funding in the Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement, and that all cases must now move with urgency, accountability and prevention at the centre — because women and girls must be able to move through South Africa without making calculations about their safety.

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