‘I called out names of victims who died at the hands of men, and was met with laughter by the ANC Joburg Caucus’

The African National Congress (ANC) in Joburg has been accused of making a mockery of a Democratic Alliance (DA) councillor’s speech on rape, femicide and gender-based violence.

DA councillor Nazley Sharif, the Section 79 Gender, Youth and People with Disabilities (Geyodi) chairperson, delivered a speech in council on these issue at the September council sitting.

During her address, ANC councillors were accused of laughing, howling and making snide comments.

“This shows the level of disregard for real-life issues that affect people. The ANC Joburg caucus behaved in this inexcusable manner in front of ANC womxn, who did not reprimand their male counterparts,” Sharif said. Womxn is a more inclusive way of spelling ‘women’, which avoids the men suffix.

The speech Sharif delivered was titled, ‘We have nothing to celebrate and everything to mourn’, which was aimed at highlighting the increase of femicide and rape in women and children.

“The speech highlighted the rate in which femicide, rape and gender-based violence in South Africa have increased,” she said.

“I called out the names of 10 victims who died at the hands of men and showed their faces and was met with laughter, howling and politicking by the ANC Joburg Caucus.”

“These are comments from men who have been elected into leadership positions,” she gasped.

But the ANC’s spokesperson, Jolidee Matongo, said the party believes femicide and gender-based violence is a sensitive matter and a ‘problem that needs to be dealt with’.

He disputed that the councillors were making a mockery of Sharif’s speech and that they were actually shocked that the councillors spoke on the matter when a motion to implement new policing structures to curb crime was rejected by the coalition government just before she spoke.

“Crime has increased in particular against women. Through the motion, we wanted to have an agreement to implement a ward-based policing programme with two cars and eight JMPD officers per ward. They will then work with the councillor to target hotspots and come up with a plan of action,” he said. Matongo said this motion was rejected by the DA.

“ANC councillors asked why the motion to create a safer environment was just rejected and now she is lamenting the high crime rate. Is it not a contradiction of the stance that the DA took earlier on?”

Public Safety MMC, Michael Sun, said council rejected the motion because the practice the ANC suggested is already in place.

“If council is already doing it, there is no reason to reaffirm it,” he said.

“Under previous administration the Joburg 10+ programme was launched. This means there are 10 officers per ward and the plus refers to all entity departments. When we took over we continued with this since it is not a bad idea, but the implementation was a problem.”

Sun responded to the ANC councillor’s claim that it is not reported to council with shock. He said reports on the programme are included in the Metro police’s quarterly reports, which the councillor should be aware of.