Cape Town - The community of Boston has taken to social media to express their concern about the increased level of sex workers patrolling the area.
One of Boston’s community members, Theo Kleynhans, who has been particularly vocal on social media regarding the prostitution, said that the 10-year situation only seems to be deteriorating as community efforts to have sex workers removed from the area continue to not be addressed.
“There has been an increase of sex workers that work within the area. They will wear clothes without underwear and flash their private parts at cars that drive by. I’ve exhausted all avenues of trying to resolve the matter and, as a community, we question our safety, because these girls are often escorted by pimps and work in illicit drug distribution.”
“Boston CID will tell them to move but once they leave, they return and continue to work. Living with prostitutes in your street is terrible, and there has been an increase in crime since the prostitution increased.”
The national Asijiki Coalition Coordinator, Constance Mathe, said that because of lack of employment during the pandemic, many women turned to sex work to in order to out food on the table. Mathe said during the peak of the pandemic, many brothels closed down and several sex workers chose to move closer to the Voortrekker Road area due to cheaper accommodation rates and a large clientele.
“Due to the nature of the job, sex workers will often use alcohol and substances to numb the pain, fear and anxieties of their profession. It is due to this and stigmatisation that many people will scapegoat sex workers for a number of issues in their communities, including illicit drug trade and petty crime.”
In response to the reports, Boston CID contract manager Brent Carolus said that while the CID receive complaints about prostitution in the area, the methods of resolving the situation are limited.
“We have to adhere to human rights and dignity. We work closely with police on this matter and only have by-laws at our disposal. We cannot forcefully make sex workers leave, we can only ask them to leave.”
Carolus said that according to their monitoring reports, between August 27 and September 26, only 12 women had been reported to be involved in prostitution in the area.
Carolus said that the situation of prostitution has to be monitored because of an alleged link between prostitution, crime and drug smuggling. He added that the CID keeps the women under surveillance because they are often complicit in crimes, along with pimps.
Weekend Argus