PRESS RELEASE 20 AUGUST 2020 THE NATIONAL SHELTER MOVEMENT CALLS FOR THE PRESIDENT TO ADDRESS FUNDING OF WOMEN’S ABUSE SHELTERS
Letter to president urging immediate intervention on funding of women’s shelters
Attention: President Cyril Ramaphosa Minister for Women Minister of Social Development 20 August 2020 RE: NATIONAL SHELTER MOVEMENT CALLS ON THE PRESIDENT TO INTERVENE AND URGENTLY ADDRESS MURDEROUS FUNDING ISSUES WITH WOMEN’S SHELTERS
Domestic Violence Safety Planning
While South Africa is in lockdown to curb the spread of the coronavirus, for some, isolating at homepresents additional risks. Know that help is available during the lockdown – for anyone at risk of domesticand gender-based violence. Download the Safety Plan – for staying safe while enduring an abusive relationship, or when planning to leave, and after leaving – during...
Press Release: GBV Victims & Shelters, COVID-19 Lockdown
While South Africans are stockpiling and preparing for a 21-day countrywide lockdown to curb the spread of the coronavirus, for some, isolating at home presents additional risks, on top of avoiding possible CoVid-19 infection. According to the National Shelter Movement of South Africa (NSM) one of its main concerns is the potential for increased violence against women and children, who...Continue reading
Women’s shelters struggle for funding
South Africa has one of the highest rates of gender-based violence, but its shelters are battling to stay afloat – and government departments have been slow to explain why, writes New Frame journalist, Zandile Bangani.Continue reading
Policing Responses to Domestic Violence: Exploring Reactions by the Police to Women in Need of Shelter
This research paper highlights weaknesses in police responses to victims of domestic violence by reviewing call logs documenting requests for assistance at three-hundred eighty-two (382) police stations across the country. The data emanates from research conducted by the Heinrich Boell Foundation (HBF) and the Tshwaranang Legal Advocacy Centre (TLAC) in Gauteng and the Western Cape in 2012 and 2013, and...
Shelters provide critical services for survivors of gender-based violence
Women activists who have been conducting countrywide protests since the peak in femicide and violence against women in September have released an appeal to the government to use a portion of the additional funding set aside by President Cyril Ramaphosa to increase and strengthen shelters for abused women and children, writes Moira Levy.Continue reading
The Long-term Impact of Shelters on the Lives of Abused Women
This publication is the final in a series of reports that the Heinrich Böll Foundation and the National Shelter Movement of South Africa have produced in relation to their ‘Enhancing State Responsiveness to Gender Based Violence (GBV): Paying the True Costs’ project’. GBV, and to be more specific, intimate partner violence (IPV), is a significant contributing factor to many women’s...Continue reading
Out of Harm’s Way: Women’s Shelters in the Eastern and Northern Cape
This publication is the fifth in a series of provincial studies describing women’s uses of shelters undertaken by the HBF and the National Shelter Movement of SA’s EU-supported ‘Enhancing State Responsiveness to GBV: Paying the True Costs’ project. It builds on and extends these prior reports by attending to all women, rather than focusing only on those experiencing intimate partner...Continue reading
What is Rightfully Due? Costing the Operations of Domestic Violence Shelters
The Hlanganisa Institute for Development in South Africa, the National Shelter Movement of South Africa and the Heinrich Böll Foundation, have recently launched a report which proposes new costing framework for shelter facilities and programmes. This is a much needed initiative as while shelters provide absolutely critical services to abused women, the majority are not only chronically under-funded – especially...Continue reading