File picture: Nadine Hutton/Bloomberg
The Vodacom Foundation, the Department of Basic Education and the Department of Social Development, have joined forces to launch a new ecosystem, aimed at positioning public schools as platforms to tackle Gender-Based Violence and Femicide (GBVF) in society.
This comes as the scourge of GBVF inflicted on women, children and members of the LGBTQI+ community continues to ravage the country and reverse the strides made in gender equality.
According to UN Women, an estimated 736 million women across the world — that is almost one in three — have been subjected to intimate partner violence, non-partner sexual violence, or both, at least once in their life. What is worrying is that this statistic does not even include sexual harassment.
On a local scale, GBVF has alarming statistics. One in four women will experience violence by men and are five times more likely to be killed, according to the UN.
President Cyril Ramaphosa has previously described gender-based violence as the “second major pandemic” we face in South Africa today.
The Vodacom-led initiative was first conceptualised in 2019 when the Basic Education department made a plea to Vodacom to provide psycho-social support in schools due to the high prevalence of gender-based violence.
Globally, one in three learners, aged 11–15, have been bullied by their peers at school, at least once, in the past month.
It is believed that girls are more likely to experience psychological bullying and have reported being made fun of because of their physical appearances, more frequently than boys.
“Vodacom collaborates with government and civil society in finding innovative solutions to some of the pressing socio-economic challenges afflicting society today. As a pioneer in the field of GBV, it was important that as we accelerate our GBV ecosystem that we looked at deploying a solution that would incorporate the schooling system,” said Takalani Netshitenzhe, External Affairs Director for Vodacom South Africa.
“There is no way that we can tackle the scourge of GBV alone as government. Government needs business and civic bodies as partners to effectively deal with gender violence in society because working together we can always do better. As a department, we commend the good work that Vodacom is doing in the GBV space, and we would like to appeal to other organisations to partner with us in the fight against the gender violence,” said Minister of Social Development, Ms Lindiwe Zulu.
The programme commenced in April 2021 in Gauteng, KZN and Mpumalanga provinces where 10 social workers were placed.
Presently, the social workers are working in 17 schools covering roughly 14 000 learners. An additional 10 social workers will start in the coming months and will be placed in Limpopo, Free State and Northern Cape provinces. Vodacom Foundation plans to add ten social workers every financial year to do this work.
BUSINESS REPORT