[imagesource: Gallo Images / Nardus Engelbrecht]

“Shocked”, “horrified”, “concerned”, and so the list goes on.

Time and time again, when confronted with statistics that show there is a constant war waged on the bodies of women and children in this county, politicians trot out the same words and quotes to show that they really care.

In fact, today is actually the start of the ’16 Days of Activism’ campaign, which will see such drastic measures taken as Parliament flying the national flag at half-mast from 6AM to 6PM each day.

Yeah, that should sort the issue out.

The theme for this year’s ’16 Days of Activism’ campaign is ‘women’s economic justice for a nonviolent and non-sexist South Africa’.

In addition, President Cyril Ramaphosa, during his recent evening address to the nation, called on citizens to wear black armbands or other signs of mourning as a mark of respect to victims of COVID-19, as well as victims of gender-based violence and femicide, for a five-day period starting today.

It’s pretty interesting timing, considering what happened yesterday in the Nelspruit Magistrates Court. Get a load of this, via EWN:

Bail conditions of a senior Mpumalanga African National Congress (ANC) member accused of raping his two children have been relaxed to allow him more time to do work for the governing party in the province.

The former MEC is out on R20,000 bail and is expected to be back in the dock next year January for the director of public of prosecution’s decision.

The PEC member was arrested in September for raping his twin daughters after the incident was reported to police in July.

Yes, you read that right.

The ANC in Mpumalanga has reinstated a member of its provincial executive committee (PEC), despite the fact that he’s out on bail and stands accused of raping his two daughters, with bail conditions relaxed so he can be more actively involved in the party.

The party branch defended the man’s immediate reinstatement (he cannot be named to protect the identity of his children), with this again from EWN:

The party argued that while the ANC at the national level dealt with the issue of asking members to “step aside”, the PEC member should be allowed to participate in party activities…

In October, he received a hero’s welcome from members of the community and the ANC when he was released on bail.

ANC Mpumalanga spokesperson Sasekane Manzini said that the decision was taken this week.

“The issue of stepping aside it’s still something that is being discussed at a national level, hence as the PEC we decided that we must also allow him to participate in the ANC up until the matter is finalised on how we are going to move forward as an organisation,” Manzini said.

Manzini also said that the decision to reinstate the man “did not mean it didn’t side with the victims”.

Could have fooled me.

Here’s the real kicker, via News24:

This is not the first time the politician, who is a former MEC, has been accused of rape. He was previously charged with raping a woman several years ago. He claimed that he had consensual sex with the woman but the woman said he forced himself on her.

The State later withdrew the charges against him.

Yes, you are innocent until proven guilty, but we live in a country where the conviction rate for crimes related to sexual abuse is staggeringly low.

According to Rape Crisis, less than 20% of rape cases reported go to trial and only 8,6% of cases result in a conviction, although accurate rape statistics are notoriously hard to produce.

Whatever the exact figures are, you don’t need numbers to tell the story of a nation whose women and children live in fear.

Despite the hollow words that come from our ruling party, there is still a great deal of good work that will happen during this year’s ’16 Days of Activism’ campaign.

The Daily Maverick has mapped out some of the events, day by day, here.

[sources:ewn&ewn&news24]