The Minerals Council partners with the NPA and GBVF Response Fund to support victims of gender-based violence

The Minerals Council South Africa and its members launched a partnership with the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) and GBVF Response Fund to support gender-based violence response centres in mining communities and labour-sending areas at a time when violence against women and children nationally has increased alarmingly.

The government’s latest crime statistics show double-digit percentage increases in murders, attempted murders and grievous bodily harm assaults against women between July and September this year compared to the same period a year earlier, flagging the urgent need for interventions to reverse the trend in gender-based violence and femicide (GBVF).

The Minerals Council, the NPA’s Sexual Offences and Community Affairs Unit and the private-sector led GBVF Response Fund have signed a memorandum of understanding for a partnership to support and work with the NPA’s Thuthuzela Care Centres (TCCs) in communities near mines or in mining and labour-sending areas.

There are more than 60 TCCs in South Africa, mainly located near hospitals, and they offer integrated services of immediate care and counselling for victims, collection of evidence and to ensure that cases are managed with the prosecution process in mind.

Mining companies pledged on Friday to support of the partnership and centres.

“GBVF is entrenched in our society and requires a multiprong and multisectoral approach for its prevention and eradication. In keeping with the UN Sustainable Development Goal 17, we require partnerships to strengthen the implementation of goals for sustainable development.”
Dr Judy Dlamini, GBVF Response Fund Chairperson.