Cape Town - Rape victims seeking help in reporting the crime or needing advice to build a stronger case now have a new place to turn to - Mxit.
Rape Crisis Cape Town Trust has teamed up with the social network to make it easier for victims, particularly in rural and poorer areas, to handle rape cases.
On Women’s Day, on Friday, Rape Crisis launched its Rape Information Portal on Mxit.
The online application, called RapeCrisis, is available in English, Afrikaans and Xhosa.
It distilled 30 years of experience working with rape survivors into a “simple yet comprehensive information package”, the Trust said.
“We paired up with Mxit in order to access the more rural and poorer areas, as well as those areas which do not have access to services, to provide them with crucial information such as how to report rape, what will happen during the forensic examination, what will happen in court, as well as the emotional effects that rape survivors experience after rape,” said Sarah Strydom, the Trust’s spokeswoman.
“This information will help rape survivors by informing them of the critical actions… such as knowing what to do immediately after being raped in terms of medical attention, to prevent HIV, pregnancy and other infections.”
Research conducted by Rape Crisis in 2011 showed that a lack of information and a poor understanding of how the criminal justice system worked were doing rape survivors an injustice.
“Our mission is to act as a bridge between the rape survivor and the criminal justice system,” said Rape Crisis director Kathleen Dey.
“Rape Crisis is committed to offering survivors information that is clear, accurate and accessible. The value of the Mxit mobile social network is that it is an inexpensive, easily accessible tool with enormous reach as it can work on nearly any phone. Women in poor and rural communities might not otherwise have had access to this vital information,” Dey said.
Mxit’s Andrew Rudge said the MySafety app was created earlier this year in response to the Anene Booysen tragedy.
Anene was 17 years old when she was gang-raped and mutilated at a construction site in the Western Cape in February. She died later that day.
Mxit has 7.3 million monthly active users, of whom 6.5 million are in South Africa.
Rudge said various handsets and mobile devices could be used to download and access the Mxit platform.
Strydom said from their experience with the rape survivors, most of the victims were teenagers and young adults.
“Being aware (of what to do after a rape) helps the survivor to be in a position to have a stronger case,” she said. “This is to prevent further trauma throughout the reporting processes to follow. We also include contact numbers to our 24-hour crisis line.”
According to the South African Medical Journal, South Africa has one of the highest incidents of rape in the world. In 2009, 68 332 cases of rape were reported to the SAPS.
The police statistics suggest that someone is raped every 35 seconds, but according to the National Institute for Crime Prevention and Reintegration of Offenders (Nicro) only one in 20 rape cases is reported.
It cites the reasons as lack of faith in the justice system and medical services, as well as the medical trauma sometimes suffered at the hands of the police and health workers.
Daily News