TEARS Foundation’s new data reveals SA’s precise and alarming GBV stats

Johannesburg, 27 August 2024 - The TEARS Foundation’s Help-at-your-fingertips helpline for GBV victims is a USSD service (*134*7355#) that sends information via a mobile phone, using simple prompt-based technology.

Titled A call to Action to Prioritise GBV in South Africa, the TEARS Foundation research provides insight into the different districts in South Africa in terms of the prevalence of violence, identifies the links between different population parameters and the occurrence of gender-based violence, as well as highlights possible interventions in districts where GBV is most prevalent.

Conducted in partnership with the University of Johannesburg (UJ), the research report covers a four-year period, from January 2020 to December 2023, focussing primarily on time series analysis, location of calls*, frequency of calls from the same number, and prevalence of calls during certain times of the year such as school  or public holidays.
 
For instance, the Limpopo province has been found to have the highest call rate at 104 calls per 100,000 people (or 6,804 calls over the four-year period), followed by North West with a call rate of 103 calls per 100,000 people (3,934 calls). The Free State, Mpumalanga and Gauteng provinces complete the top five, with call rates of 99, 97 and 93 respectively (2,920; 4,701 and 14,072 calls). The findings include that the largest number of calls were received on Sundays (8,541) followed by Tuesdays (8,524), and Mondays (8,332).
 
The precise statistics, according to Mara Glennie, Founder at TEARS Foundation, are a positive step towards improving data on gender-based violence and help inform efforts aimed at developing better, responsive and appropriate interventions, resources and policies. Such intelligence exposes where to target resources and what kinds of support is required, while also serving an important monitoring and evaluation function to determine the efficacy of interventions.
 
“Our findings come at a perfect time, considering President Cyril Ramaphosa’s recent National Council on Gender-Based Violence and Femicide (GBVF) Bill, which will play a critical part in helping coordinate and provide strategic leadership to the efforts,” Glennie said. “South Africa will only combat gender-based violence and femicide through strengthened work on prevention and response, which will only work through a multi-sectoral approach with promotion of gender equality at its core.”
 
While the findings are based on 53,004 calls received over the four-year period, this number excludes the calls that were not completed, wished to remain anonymous, and could not be captured for the sake of pure accuracy.
 
Professor Corné Davis, Associate Professor at the Department of Strategic Communication, Faculty of Humanities at UJ also noted that the imbalance of power relationships in families and communities are partly the root cause of gender-based violence, and that while GBV affects both men and women; it tends to target women specifically for a variety of reasons and has a disproportionate impact on them.
 
Glennie added: “The fight against femicide and gender-based violence in South Africa is imperative and not an issue that can wait any longer. The issue requires an immediate response that is innovative and collaborative. Part of this means improving and adapting responses to uncertain and challenging contexts, for instance, through technology and innovative approaches that allow us to expand the scale of services and do so with quality.”
 
She said that research shows people are aware of the prevalence of the different kinds of GBV being perpetrated in South Africa and agree that addressing the issue of GBV must extend to the workplace, understanding the high GBV prevalence in the country. More especially because previous research; Exploring the Impact of Gender-Based Violence in South Africa and The Costly Impact of GBV – Private Sector Perceptions and Realities in South Africa, proved that GBV necessarily impacts victims’ performance at work and hence the profitability of the company.
 
Heeding the earlier research findings, TEARS Foundation appealed to business leaders to speak out against gender inequality in the workplace and to address issues such as gender discrimination, while providing more support to enable women’s empowerment.
 
“We had recommended that organisations enable complaint and response mechanisms that could also help to address the silence that perpetuated GBV,” Glennie concluded. “Private sector should act to prevent GBV within companies through strategy, HR-led policies, systems, awareness training, communication and dialogue.”
 
For more information on TEARS Foundation’s HAYFT helpline and specific data on the research, visit https://tears.co.za/
 
* Calls refer to TEARS Foundation’s USSD helpline. USSD (Unstructured Supplementary Service Data) is a global system for mobile communications (GSM) protocol that is used to send text messages. USSD is similar to Short Message Service (SMS).