Woman beater ducks debate
Panelist Mduduzi Manana withdraws from gala fundraiser event after outcry from gender activists on social media
Convicted woman beater and former member of parliament Mduduzi Manana has pulled out of a gender-based violence fundraising gala dinner scheduled to take place at the East London Golf Club on Saturday.
This comes as the country commemorates Women’s Day and after a huge public outcry about Manana’s involvement in the event.
Manana pulled out on Wednesday after his face and that of deputy minister of telecommunications and postal services Stella Ndabeni were plastered on one of the posters promoting the event, organised by the NGO Shevolution Africa.
Manana’s withdrawal was confirmed by Shevolution chair Buhle Tonise, who told the Daily Dispatch it was a result of the public outcry about his involvement as a panelist.
“We saw that people did not understand the vision of the whole event.
“Mr Manana was not going to be a guest speaker, he was merely going to be part of the panel as an offender, and not in any other capacity.”Masimanyane Women’s Rights International, however, said they would still go ahead with the protest they had planned against the event.
Executive director Lesley-Ann Foster said: “We are protesting against the whole event as we find it to be humiliating against gender-based violence victims.
“There is no scientific proof that if you bring together victims and perpetrators under one roof that will contribute towards the healing of the victim.
“We have been in this field for 20 years and we know how painful and traumatising it is for women to face abusers.“It’s a lie that they are supporting women.
“There is a net profit involved that they claim will go towards the survivors and that is absolutely humiliating.
“It means a certain portion of the profit will be given to the survivors and not all of it.
“How are we now exploiting and making money out of women’s pain?”
Tonise said she was disappointed by the planned protest as the money made from the gala event was meant to go towards building the house of “Lion Mama”, the Eastern Cape woman who last year stabbed and killed one of three men she believes she found raping her daughter.
Foster said the original plan to have a national day for women had failed dismally as women in the country remained “poor, vulnerable and deprived of their rights.
“Women experience brutality every day.
“They are murdered. The day has failed to yield the results it was meant to yield.”
Business Women’s Association of South Africa (Bwasa) board member Kerry Anne Oosthuysen said Women’s Day shouldn’t be celebrated given the continuance of deep-rooted patriarchy, gross unemployment, and disproportionate levels of income and landownership as opposed to men.
“Premised on the maxim that ‘what gets measured gets done’, Bwasa has for the past decade sought to measure and track the upward mobility of women in the South African economy and gender equality through an annual census report, namely the South African Women in Leadership Census (the Census Report).
“The 2017 census study researched 277 JSE-listed companies and once again found near absence of gender diversity with only 4.7% companies having female CEOs, 6.9% female chairs, 19.1% female directors and 29.5% female executive managers.
“A dismal state of affairs.”Oosthuysen said a pandemic of gender-based violence which “the state merely ignores with no implemented national strategic plan” made things worse.
“Recently Statistics South Africa released a report titled “Crime Against Women in South Africa”, which reaffirms the prevalence of rape and sexual offences as one of the highest in the world.
“What is extremely disturbing is the finding regarding women’s attitudes towards domestic violence, wherein it was believed that in certain situations that it was acceptable for a man to hit a woman.”
Last week more than 100 women in Buffalo City Metro took to the streets and marched as part of a countrywide #TotalShutdown movement.
They delivered a memorandum to mayor Xola Pakati at the City Hall.
At the march, the mayor came under fire after failing to address an incident allegedly involving his bodyguard.
The man was accused of “aggressively” pushing #TotalShutDown movement spokesperson Aphiwe Ntlemeza.
The mayor took the memorandum from the marchers and went inside the city hall without addressing the crowd.
President Cyril Ramaphosa will deliver the keynote address at a National Women’s Day event in Mbekweni, Paarl, in the Western Cape.
The theme is “100 Years of Albertina Sisulu, Woman of Fortitude: Women United in Moving South Africa Forward”.
In a statement, the presidency said: “As part of advancing the empowerment of women and pursuing the defeat of patriarchy, the government regards Women’s Day as an opportunity to pay tribute to the many heroines of the women’s struggle and to also review progress made in addressing gender disparities.”..
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