Dear Fellow South African,
Tomorrow (9 August) we’ll commemorate the day in 1956 when hundreds of women marched on the Union Buildings to protest towards apartheid cross legal guidelines.
We are all aware of the iconic picture of Rahima Moosa, Lilian Ngoyi, Helen Joseph and Sophie Williams de Bruyn marching defiantly up the stairs of the amphitheatre of the Union Buildings on that historic day.
In their arms had been hundreds of petitions from women throughout the nation to Prime Minister JG Strijdom.
The petition opens with the phrases: “We are women of every race, we come from the cities and the towns, from the reserves and the villages. We come as women united in our purpose to save the African women from the degradation of passes.”
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They spoke about the affect these cross legal guidelines would have on black women. Families could be damaged up and kids left neglected. They spoke of worry of arrest and humiliation and degradation at the arms of policemen. They spoke of dropping the basic proper to maneuver freely from one place to a different. They argued that with their actions restricted, they’d be unable to earn an honest residing, to take up an occupation or to review.
In the South Africa of right this moment, women get pleasure from the basic rights and freedoms that their grandmothers and great-grandmothers had been denied.
Today, women can advance in any occupation, research in a spot and subject of their selection and personal companies. Thanks to employment fairness laws and different insurance policies of the democratic authorities, women’s illustration in the office, in authorities and all of society continues to develop.
Gender equality
According to South Africa’s most up-to-date assessment of progress in the direction of the Sustainable Development Goals, we’re on an upward pattern in the direction of the achievement of gender equality.
There are a number of areas the place the illustration of women has been on the rise.
In Parliament, 46% of National Assembly members are women. Currently, 62% of the total public service is feminine, and 44% of senior administration posts are crammed by women.
The present administration has accelerated the agenda for advancing women’s illustration by appointing the first lady to move the National Prosecuting Authority and the first feminine Directors-General in the State Security Agency and the Presidency.
Last week we appointed the first feminine Deputy National Commissioner of the South African Police Service, and final month Justice Mandisa Maya was appointed as South Africa’s first feminine Deputy Chief Justice. Out of 256 judges on the Bench, 114 are feminine and almost half of all magistrates are feminine.
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Representation of women issues an incredible deal.
We come from a painful previous the place younger black women and ladies had restricted prospects. Seeing black women occupy the highest echelons of society as ministers, judges, enterprise leaders, engineers and fighter pilots is an inspiration and an encouragement to the many who hope to comply with of their footsteps.
Another space of progress is the proper to reproductive well being care, which is enshrined in our Constitution. Unlike a quantity of international locations, South African women have entry to contraception and secure termination of being pregnant in the public well being system.
The democratic state has labored to repeal all legal guidelines that discriminate towards women, and over the years our courts have dominated towards insurance policies and practices that unfairly discriminate towards women on the grounds of motherhood, sexual orientation or different elements.
We have legal guidelines that shield women towards harassment in the office and that deal with trendy varieties of victimisation of women. Women in conventional communities have rights to personal land, to enter into contracts and to inherit.
Gender-based violence
The prevalence of gender-based violence stays one of our greatest obstacles in the direction of attaining full and significant gender equality.
Just as the 1956 Women’s March despatched a sign that equal rights for women was an necessary objective of nationwide liberation, ending all varieties of violence towards women and kids is important to our nationwide progress.
This will not be an issue of women, however an issue of males. And it’s males who’re being referred to as upon to be half of the resolution, beginning with their very own attitudes and conduct.
Even as we work as a collective to rid society of gender-based violence, we must always not diminish the progress now we have made in constructing a non-sexist society. We must celebrate the many achievements of women in our nation and pay tribute to those that proceed to guide the manner.
As we work to realize gender equality in all areas of stay, we must acknowledge that now we have come a good distance. And that we nonetheless have a lot additional to go.
