It is no secret that gender-based violence and femicide (GBVF) is a pandemic in South Africa. On 17th February the Minister of Police, Bheki Cele, delivered an overview of the 2022/2023 quarter three crime statistics. There had been an 11.6% rise in all forms of contact crimes, with murder increasing by 10.1% and a 9.6% increase in sexual offences. It is probable that intimate partner femicide accounted, in part, for the increase in the murder tally, but these statistics have not yet been disaggregated. Domestic abuse can and does occur in all socio-economic groups, across all racial groups, and amongst men and women of varying educational brackets.
Response – The Crime Statistics and Gender-Based ViolenceFemicide by Lois Law