Xolani Koyana
YOUNG children are increasingly becoming vulnerable to rapists, and recent figures show that at least two minors a day have been raped in the past three months.
This is based on figures from three health care centres in the province providing assistance to rape survivors – the Mitchells Plain Forensic Unit and the Worcester and Khayelitsha Thuthuzela care centres.
Between June and August, counsellors at the three centres saw 114 children who were raped. A further 76 cases were categorised as suspected rape because the children could not articulate what happened to them, according to the Mosaic training, service and healing centre for women.
This has resulted in a number of cases before court being withdrawn. Khayelitsha alone had 108 reported cases – 80 confirmed and 38 suspected. Recently Gugulethu has had a spate of child rape incidents with at least six arrests since August.
Thuthuzela, headed by the National Prosecuting Authority, is focused on providing medial care for rape survivors and secondary trauma counselling. It works with the criminal justice system to achieve speedy convictions. It also works closely with the police, the departments of social development and health and NGOs.
Mosaic said victims’ ages range from a few months old to 17 years old. In the week of September 7 to 13, police in the province had recorded eight cases of child rape where victims were under the age of 5, Community Safety MEC Dan Plato said.
This followed a spate of incidents in Gugulethu where in just one one street two children were recently raped within a month of each other. One of them, 10-year-old Chelsea Godlo, was killed in August and her attackers, who are relatives, have appeared in court. In the other incident a 33-year-old man was arrested for allegedly raping his 10-year-old daughter. According to the recent crime stats, 60 percent of the rapes in the Western Cape are committed by people known to the victim.
The UN Association of South Africa, which is set to hold a Human Rights Programme in Stellenbosch on Thursday, has said that the high levels of violence against women and children in some communities in the country are unacceptable.
“The increase in rapes of infants and young children reported on almost a daily basis in newspapers is an indication of the serious lack of respect for the human rights of victims. More should be done to educate South African citizens on respect for human rights and the human rights situation in South Africa,” the organisation said.
It said advocacy for policies and laws must be increased to ensure that children’s rights were protected and promoted at all times.
But Mosaic, one of the NGOs based at the Thuthuzela centres, said this was not happening.
“Rape, sexual offences in general as well as domestic violence has become the norm and not the exception. Previously I have used the analogy that domestic violence has become like Kellogg’s – almost in every home,” the organisation’s visibility and partnership manager, Arnelle Meyer, said.
“There is complacency around issues of sexual and domestic violence and voices are raised to bring about awareness during very specific times of the year (March – International Women’s Day, August – National Women’s month and during the 16 days of activism) and in addition, when rape cases are in the media.”
Meyer said the figures showed that it was not uncommon for so many cases to be reported in one week. There was a need for an increased prosecution rate for sexual offences.
“This should send a clear message to perpetrators that the state will not tolerate sexual offences. There needs to be increased support to civil society organisations that focus on providing psychosocial support to survivors of sexual violence on a long-term basis,” she said.
In addition, Meyer said the government should have more social workers to be able to deal with case loads and increased support for the Basic Education Department to ensure that pupils were educated on the Children’s Act as well as the Sexual Offences Act.
She said a greater emphasis should be placed on rehabilitation of perpetrators as well as turning the victims into survivors.
Dependent on the type of abuse, type of perpetrator, level of violence and other factors, psychologist Jillian Butterworth said the damage and effects could be far-reaching – right into adulthood.
She said no two children were the same, but when looking for signs of abuse it was important to look for changes in their behaviour.