National campaign to fight gender-based violence launches in Nelson Mandela Bay

01 Feb 2016 | Admin Author

Businesswoman and rape survivor, Andy Kawa, has officially launched a national campaign to mobilise society in a campaign of zero tolerance against rape and gender-based violence.

Kawa established her lobby group Kwanele Enuf is Enuf after she was brutally attacked and raped while walking on a Port Elizabeth beach in 2010.

Speaking at the launch of Kwanele Wednesday's at Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University on Wednesday, Kawa said they've started with universities which have been the first to embark on this initiative.

She says she's hoping that this campaign will gain momentum next year and be taken up by business as well as civil society organisations.

"We would like every Wednesday's for South African to remind themselves of the ideal of a secure country where there is zero tolerance against rape. We also want organisations, communities and families to look at what they can do to attain this zero tolerance." said Kawa.

The campaign is being supported by NMMU as well as the Nelson Mandela Bay Business Chamber and the Nelson Mandela Bay Development Agency.

NMMU Vice Chancellor, Professor Derrick Swartz said that rape and gender-based violence is written into South Africa's history and is a problem that still haunts the nation.

Swartz said that the structural violence of the past created conditions that has made it so difficult to transform this phenomena.

He says 23 other universities around the country have indicated that they will provide platforms to promote the campaign.