South Africa

On 2 December 2021, the Heinrich Böll Foundation launched its second research brief associated to its “Care and Support in a Time of Epidemic" research project. The project is dedicated to better understanding how COVID-19, and the subsequent implementation of lockdown in South Africa on 27 March 2020 has impacted on domestic violence in the country.

Women are also marginalised when it comes to the economic benefits that mining brings.

In a country characterised by myriad gates, security personnel and other barriers, taking ownership of public space might entail both raising awareness of what public space means and thinking about our private spaces differently. Khayelitsha resident Khanya Qongqo takes us on her journey to this conclusion.

Over the past two and half months, South Africa's LGBTIQ+ community has been rocked by a series of brutal hate crimes against its members - from KwaZulu-Natal to Gauteng, from the Eastern Cape to the Western Cape. At least six lives - that we know of - have been snuffed out in cold blood. We share here a joint statement by some of our partners calling for more to be done about these horrendous crimes!

Most of food production in Africa is shouldered by small scale farmers and the majority of farmers are women. Alarmed by the effects of climate change on her family’s farm Ayakha Melithafa from South Africa’s Western Cape joined an environmental school club and engages now in a national and an international youth movements for climate justice.

For centuries, resources have been extracted from the African continent without adequate payment or compensation. With colonialism, Khoikhoi and San, the first inhabitants of Southern Africa, lost their land and many lost their lives. During decades of Apartheid they were racially discriminated and still have to fight for political and economic inclusion in the post-Apartheid era. We spoke to the Khoikhoi lawyer Lesle Jansen about her fight for the community and for the legal acknowledgement of the cultural heritage of Indigenous people.

Our partner NSM has recently penned an open letter to President Cyril Ramaphosa calling for an intervention to urgently address the murderous funding issues with women's shelters.

While South Africans are preparing for lockdown, isolating at home presents additional risks for abused victims, says the National Shelter Movement.