[imagesource: Ayanda Ndamane/African News Agency]

South Africa is notorious for its high levels of gender-based violence (GBV).

To make matters worse, the crimes against women feel impossible to abate when government officials are often the perpetrators.

One angry Limpopo lady gave a rather stern warning to the Greater Tzaneen municipality mayor Gerson Molapisane, asking him to “tell your councillors to zip their trousers”.

Per The Citizen, Molapisane was visiting the villages of Tickyline, outside Lenyenye in the Mopani district in Limpopo, to speak to the residents about service delivery issues.

The residents released their fury on all the officials present at the meeting (from social development, health, public works and Eskom), accusing government officials of snoring on the job and most alarmingly, accusing ANC councillors of demanding sex before employing women:

To the delight of the residents, one of them, Dina Mmatjokotja stood up and told Molapisane: “Honourable mayor, please speak to your councillors. Tell them to zip their trousers because this is not attractive at all.”

To clarify her point, she went on to say that some officials were demanding sex in exchange for employment:

“They mostly target us, young mothers or those still fresh from high school or varsity. When you refuse, they will make sure that your CV is thrown into the dustbin,” she said.

“Some of them are here. They are sitting in the VIP tent, pretending to be holy, when they are actually sex pests.

“I refused to bow down to pressure. I refused to open my legs in exchange for a job at the municipality.”

She added that some of the councillors are “rotten to the core” and pleaded with the mayor to take action against these councillors who “abuse their powers” as “they want to sleep with us before they give us jobs in construction, water and sanitation provision, at the waste-filled site and in your municipality”.

She then alleged that the councillors only see a woman as a sex object, and said that they need to zip up their trousers, “or else all hell will break loose”.

Molapisane assured that the municipality “hates corruption with passion” and only ever appoints people “based on merits and nothing else”.

He also said these allegations would be investigated, adding that “we will not tolerate sex pests in my municipality”.

Yes, Molapisane, herd your men and keep them in check.

[source:citizen]