Justice system must not let any rapist go free

We have a problem and that problem, on face value, wears pants.

We need to have a serious talk about rapists and why they enjoy any sympathy from factions in our society.

If the men we are breeding are the reason so many families are mourning their daughters, searching for their missing daughters and attending court cases seeking justice for their sisters, we, as a country, must admit that have a problem: we are breeding perpetrators.

We refuse to acknowledge his changing face: when an allegation of rape surfaces, we are quick to defend the dignity of the accused.

I have always felt that the domineering male figure that is gaining traction in South Africa is a hindrance to the growth of the country.

We have a right to not live in constant fear; we have a right to walk around in this country, or anywhere else in the world, without a target on our backs.

Who gave the men of our society, generation and time the right to tamper with those rights?

More alarming is the expectation for women to speak out as a means to end the bloodbath… Speak out, so that we may demonstrate our abuse to desensitised court officials, convince disinterested police that our tears are genuine. We must jump through the fires of the justice system, just to eventually be denied justice when the perpetrators walk the same streets three or four years later.

Teach the men; chastise the men; arrest and punish the men who continue to hunt us as their prey. This is not our doing, we are merely the survivors of their sick, perverted and out-of-control urges.

This society, this very society where I wish to raise a man of character in, is nothing but a haven for men who go unpunished, undeterred.

The justice system, you say? Abusers are given light sentences and are released even before the ink on their judgments dries.

Society needs to learn – as we have with Brickz, R Kelly and many other celebrities – justice cannot be blinded by the glitz and glam of social status.

Let the trials begin… for all rapists.

Kekeletso Nakeli-Dhliwayo.

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