Next month, the second Presidential Summit on Gender-Based Violence and Femicide (GBVF) will be hosted by President Cyril Ramaphosa.
The summit, which will be scheduled for 1 to 2 November 2022 at Gallagher Estate in Midrand, will examine the progress made since the first Presidential Summit on GBVF in November 2018. In addition, it will include a summary of significant accomplishments and obstacles, as well as solutions for overcoming them.
The inaugural Presidential Summit on GBVF in 2018 was a response to the 24 requests given to President Cyril Ramaphosa by the #TheTotalShutdown Intersectional Womxn’s Movement after 27 national marches on 1 August 2018.
As a remedy to the prevalent problem of gender-based violence and femicide in the nation, the movement proposed the 24 demands (https://gbvf.org.za/tag-24-demands-01-august-2018/). Chief among the requests was a request that the President organise the continent’s first-ever conference on gender-based violence and femicide.
This culminated in the Summit Declaration, which proclaimed GBVF a national problem in March 2019; it was the first step in establishing the National Strategic Plan on Gender-Based Violence and Femicide (NSP on GBVF).
The NSP on GBVF (https://www.justice.gov.za/vg/gbv/NSP-GBVF-FINAL-DOC-04-05.pdf) provides a strategic roadmap and specific plans for a multisectoral approach to end GBVF and build a society in which women, children, and the LGBTQIA+ community are safe from violence directed at them due to patriarchal stereotypes.
The National Security Strategy is comprised of six pillars: accountability, coordination, and leadership; preventive and social cohesion rebuilding; justice, safety, and protection; response, care, support, and healing; economic power; and research and information management.
The Presidency noted that four years had passed since the Presidential Summit and the approval of the Presidential Summit Declaration, as well as two years when the President signed the NSP on GBVF into effect on April 30, 2020.
While progress has been made in implementing the 2019 Presidential Summit Declaration and its national GBVF plan, the government has warned that the prevalence of gender-based violence and the brutality with which it is perpetrated against women of all ages and in all regions fundamentally undermines democracy and women’s human rights.
Dr. Olive Shisana, co-chair of the Presidential Summit Planning Committee, said that this year’s summit would provide a chance for feedback and accountability for problems addressed during the last summit. Shisana said that it would give an evaluation of the effect of programmes and recommendations on how to enhance programmes that make a difference.
“For example, measuring impact against expenditure allows us to prioritise and duplicate programmes that are yielding tangible results. The return on investment also talks to amplification in how we scale up successful projects to roll these out across the country.
“As a country, we must double our efforts to prevent and respond to GBVF and hold each other accountable to implement the NSP. As a planning committee for the summit, we are hard at work to prepare for all to account for commitments made, and accelerate and amplify implementation,” said Shisana.
Sibongile Ndashe, co-chairperson of the PSPC, said civil society is not immune to the prevailing “summit fatigue”.
“However, we welcome the invitation to co-create a space where accountability is a possibility. We are approaching the summit with information on most of the failures that have frustrated the implementation of the NSP on GBVF. We know what has not been done,” Ndashe said.
Provincial summits
The theme of the Presidential Summit will be “Accountability, Acceleration and Amplification, NOW!’
Provinces will organise provincial summits in the lead-up to the summit to report on the implementation of the NSP on GBVF, as well as the drivers, obstacles, and opportunities for implementation.
The provincial summits will yield insights that will be compiled into reports and presented to the Presidential Summit. In addition, in October, National Pillar Dialogues will be held to evaluate the implementation of the NSP on GBVF.
The committee said that preparations are also being made to fund the summit and invited partners to join the battle to eradicate GBVF in South Africa.