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Issue Papers
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South Africa reportedly has one of the highest rates of violence against women in the world. A 1996 comparison of South African crime ratios to those of one hundred other countries revealed South Africa to be the leader in the incidence of murder, rape, robbery, and violent theft.1 In the 1997 South African Government Report2 rape and sexual abuse of children was found to be increasing rapidly and a "matter of grave concern." Furthermore, from 1996 to 1998 girls aged seventeen and under constituted approximately 40% of reported rape and attempted rape victims nationally.3
The violent society within which South Africans find themselves on a daily basis needs to be contextualised within the history of the country and the violence attributed to apartheid. South Africa's political, social and economic conditions have all been shaped and devastated by apartheid. This violent legacy in turn places a heavy burden on the education system in the country. Apartheid was directly applied to the education system and the "Bantu" Education system imposed by the apartheid government has had a devastating impact on the education system in the country.
Before considering the prevalence of sexual violence and sexual harassment of learners in South Africa it is necessary to critically analyse the current statistics relating to sexual violence against all women in the country. The most recently available statistics4 from the South African Police Services website indicate that in 1998, there were 35,105 reported rapes and attempted rapes in South Africa. In 1999 there were 36,022 cases of rape reported to the police nationally. These do not correlate with the figures released by the South African Police Services ("SAPS") as part of the Interpol report, which indicate the statistic for 1999 to be 51,249.5 This discrepancy may be as a result of the debate that raged in the South African Press in 2001, which resulted in an immediate embargo being placed on the release of crime statistics by the SAPS. In 2001 SAPS released rape statistics and Rape Crisis, Cape Town, who averred that the actual figures were much higher due to the large percentage of women who fail to report rape, challenged these figures. The Minister of Safety and Security at the time responded and issued the following press statement:
"During June 2000 the National Commissioner of the South African Police Service advised that on reviewing progress of their crime-combating operations, top management of the SAPS had expressed concerns regarding the integrity and reliability of certain crime statistics used for operational planning. A review of the situation with regard to statistics, as well as the report of the findings and recommendations of the Orkin Committee of Enquiry ... led to a decision by myself to place a moratorium on the release of crime statistics with effect from 20 July 2000. This was deemed necessary to avoid ineffective planning and the wasteful use of resources and funds. We also had to take into account that the statistics we release are also used by other departments and institutions outside the Police."6 [My emphasis]
Rape Crisis responded as follows:7
"While Rape Crisis Cape Town agrees that we need to use statistics carefully and also that we need to be especially cautious with extrapolations, we believe that the critical issue is the undeniably high rate of rape in South Africa, not whether the actual figure is 20 or 30 times higher than the reported figure. In this regard, we would like to make a number of points.
Firstly, the narrow definition rape in South African law excludes the following from the reported statistics:
- Rape of men and male children;
- Oral rape;
- Rape with objects.
In 1998, there were 49 280 reported rapes and 4 851 reported sexual assaults; when the 179 incest reports are added to these figures, we arrive at a total of 54 310. Many of these would more appropriately be reported as rapes if our definition of rape was less limited. Thus, the first point is that reported rape will likely be higher once the definition is broadened - something which is currently being looked at by the South African Law Commission. According to Rape Crisis Cape Town statistics for the last three years, around 50% of our clients had reported the rape to the police. Of note here is that, precisely because they have come to speak with our counsellors, our clients are likelier to have reported the rape than not. So the second point to be made is that, from our own experience, we are confident that the actual rape figures are AT LEAST twice as high as the reported figures....
Finally, the figure of one rape every 26 seconds is based on a reporting rate of around 1 in 20, and not the 1 in 36 claimed by the South African Police Services in 1997. At Rape Crisis, Cape Town we have preferred to take a more conservative view on the issue, and generally use the 1 in 20 extrapolation. (If there were 54 310 REPORTED rapes, indecent assaults and incest cases in 1998, and only 1 in 20 is reported, then the actual figure is 1 086 200, which is 2 976 rapes per day, or more than two a minute."
The aforegoing debate highlights the problems in relation statistics and the reliability thereof. However, the writer endorses Rape Crisis, Cape Town's view that statistics should not be used as a tool to detract from the realities surrounding violence against women in South Africa. Irrespective of whether one in 20 or one in 36 women report rape, the reality is that rape has reached endemic proportions in the country and many women do not report it. The inadequacies of the state response thereto should be the focus, rather than whether one in 20 or one in 36 report rape.
Whilst there appears to be some debate around the issue of violence against women and girls at schools, there appears to be no data or statistics around the incidences of sexual violence perpetrated as against boy learners within the school system. This is an aspect, which requires further investigation and has been highlighted by Rape Crisis, Cape Town, as being part of the problem around the definition of rape. Since the current legal definition of rape does not include the rape of a male, the statistics available do not include males.
Having stated the aforegoing, it is important to note that the fact that there are no definitive statistics around sexual offences in respect of boys in South Africa is an aspect which needs to be urgently addressed in order to effectively monitor the state response thereto.
Turning to the education system, it is clear that today in South Africa's constitutional democracy education is seen as a basic universal human right and as a powerful tool in the fight against oppression, exploitation and poverty. However, sexual harassment and sexual violence against learners within the school system has been identified as being a serious problem in educational institutions across the country.
The Gender Equity Task Team (GETT) commissioned in 1996 by the Department of Justice to analyse the education system from a gender perspective, identified the problem of sexual violence in schools as severe and systemic.8 The GETT Report noted that while violence and harassment had been documented in the behaviour of teachers, and students towards other students, there was insufficient data about the prevalence of violence in schools or who the perpetrators were.
A later study by CIETafrica in 1998 found that one in every three Johannesburg schoolgirls has experienced sexual violence at school and, of these, only 36% said they reported the episode to someone (not necessarily the police).9
In the Human Rights Watch Report, dated March 2001, it was found that "on a daily basis in schools across the nation, South African girls of every race and economic class encounter sexual violence and harassment at school that impedes their realization of the right to education."10
The most recent report released by Human Rights Watch is probably the most useful way of assessing the extent of the problem today. The research conducted by Human Rights Watch was done by interviewing girls from a variety of different social, economic and ethnic backgrounds. During March and April 2000 Human Rights Watch investigated cases of alleged sexual violence and harassment involving schoolgirls. Eight public schools in KwaZulu-Natal, Gauteng and the Western Cape province were visited in order to conduct interviews with girls, as well as school administrators and teachers. Interviews were also conducted with girls who had been sexually abused or assaulted at school but were no longer at school. Parents, social workers and nongovernmental organisations were also consulted.
The results show that sexual violence occurs in prestigious predominantly white schools, in impoverished predominantly black township schools, in schools for the learning disabled, and even in primary schools. Privilege did not protect the learner from sexual violence, whilst poverty was found to often render a learner more vulnerable to assault.11 This needs to be contextualised within the frame-work of poverty stricken areas where learners need to travel long distances in order to arrive at school and often make use of public transport, which in itself is inherently unsafe and dangerous. It also means that learners are more open to accepting transport from educators, which may in turn result in some form of sexual violence. Human Rights Watch further found that at most of the previously disadvantaged schools there was very little or no monitoring of what happened on school premises during and after school hours. For example, learners were being abused in toilets or secluded classrooms where there was no supervision at the time. Alcohol and drug abuse and the unmonitored presence of alcohol and drugs on school premises also contributed to the problem of sexual violence.
The forms of violence experienced within the school system have been documented12 to include:
- rape and sexual coercion;
- sexual abuse;
- sexual harassment;
- sexual assault;
- intimidation;
- sexualised touching; or
- emotional abuse in the form of threats of violence.
Girls were found to often encounter highly sexualized verbal degradation in the school environment. The different forms of sexual violence were found to be committed by other learners, by teachers or other school employees. In dealing with the prevalence of sexual harassment and sexual violence within the school system Erika George, the author of the Human Rights Watch Report, concludes as follows:13
"Human Rights Watch found that sexual abuse and harassment of girls by both teachers and other students is widespread in South Africa...
Far from being a problem only for schools with few resources, sexual violence permeates the whole of the South African Education system... Based on our interviews with educators, social workers, children, and parents, the problem of teachers engaging in serious sexual misconduct with underage female students is widespread."
It should be noted at this juncture that the Report focussed only on girls who had been subjected to some form of sexual harassment or sexual violence and did not examine the extent of the same problem amongst male learners. The Human Rights Watch Report does, furthermore, not provide any statistical data flowing from its investigation but does quote a 1998 Medical Research Council Survey which found that among those rape victims who specified their relationship to the perpetrator 37.7% said their schoolteacher or principal had raped them.14 The Report goes on to conclude that:15
"Neither national nor provincial departments of education systematically monitor incidents of violence in schools. Similarly, there are no data systems to facilitate the evaluation of crime statistics on the basis of where the crime was committed. While quantitative data on school violence is not available, the existing evidence, confirmed by Human Rights Watch's own research, strongly suggests that violence -sexual or otherwise - is prevalent in many South African schools, undermining the ability of these schools to achieve their developmental and educational objectives."
Based on the aforegoing it is clear that the lack of statistics dealing with sexual violence within schools is as problematic as the lack of national statistics dealing with violence against women. Therefore any strategy to be adopted should focus inter alia on obtaining reliable records and statistics in order to monitor the extent of the problem and the effectiveness of any remedial action taken.
Notes
1 South African Police Service, "Semester
Report1/1999 : International Crime Ratios According to the 1996 Interpol
Report" available at http: //www.saps.org.za
2 Government of National Unity, Initial Country Report:
South Africa: Convention on the Rights of the Child (South Africa: Government
of National Unity, 1997 - page 60
3 Hirschowitz, et al. "Quantitative Research Findings
on Rape in South Africa" pages 21-24
4 http://www/saps.org.za
5 Hirschowitz, et al. "Quantitative Research Findings
on Rape in South Africa" pages 21-24
6 Press Statement dated 31 May 2001 issued by Minister
Steve Tshwete available at http://www.saps.org.za
7 Accessed at http://www.rapecrisis.org.za
8 Wolpe "Gender Equity in Education" page 219
9 Available as part of Rape Crisis statistics: http://www.rapecrisis.org.za
10 Human Rights Watch Report "Scared at School:
Sexual Violence Against South African Girls in South African Schools"
- March 2001
11 Human Rights Watch Report supra note 8 - Chapter 5:
"Sexual Violence in Schools"
12 Ibid
13 Human Rights Watch Report supra note 8 - Chapter 1:
"Preface" and Chapter 5: "Sexual Violence in Schools"
14 Human Rights Watch Report - Chapter 5: "Sexual
Violence in Schools" quoting Hirschowitz et al.
15 Ibid - Chapter 4: "Background"
