March at Cape Town’s Princess Vlei highlights danger for women after sunset

Words: Matthew Hirsch / GroundUp

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About 100 people marched along the Princess Vlei walking trail as the sun set in Cape Town on Friday. They were protesting against gender-based violence (GBV). They held the march at night to emphasise how safety in the city changes for women and children after sunset.

They were joined by neighbourhood watch groups and social development MEC Wendy Kaizer-Philander.

The march follows the murders of 12 women in Ekurhuleni, Gauteng, in just two months. It sparked a wave of protests across the country.

‘Ekurhuleni was just the tipping point … It is an example of what has been happening in our communities for a long time,’ said Lucinda Evans, who organised march and who is director of Philisa Abafazi Bethu, a safety shelter in Steenberg.

‘On a normal day when the sun sets, it changes everything for a woman: everything from what she thinks and how she moves. Men will never be able to understand this,’ she said.

At Friday’s march, men, women and children carried placards that read ‘stop GBV’ and ‘end the silence, end GBV’.

Evans said that the Ekurhuleni murders had opened a ‘portal of anger and anguish in this broken country with so much violence’.

‘Ekurhuleni symbolises how the government has failed over and over,’ she said.

Organisers said the march was also a space for men to open up about how GBV affects them. Picture: Matthew Hirsch

In an address to the nation last month, President Cyril Ramaphosa pledged more resources to fight GBV.

‘Resources have been allocated to strengthen the Family Violence, Child Protection and Sexual Offences units. More resources will be allocated by the Minister of Finance in the Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement,’ he said.

The President also promised that a first consolidated report about the actions taken would be issued within 90 days, with public progress reports every quarter thereafter.

Evans criticised Ramaphosa’s address, saying ‘his speech was the exact same speech all of us heard in 2019. It’s a broken system … it means absolutely nothing’.

Evans stressed that Friday’s march provided an important opportunity to engage with men and give them a space to be vulnerable around the issue of GBV. It is important for men to call each other to order, she said.

‘They don’t because they feel that if I do this, they might not be accepted. It happens in all circles. This march is just the beginning of a much deeper conversation we hope will happen.’

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**Picture: **Matthew Hirsch / GroundUp

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