Keypoints:
- Ramaphosa orders nationwide case review
- Municipal safety audits due within 60 days
- Government targets forensic delays and alcohol violence
SOUTH African President Cyril Ramaphosa has ordered police, prosecutors and municipalities to take urgent action to protect women after the discovery of 11 women’s bodies in Ekurhuleni triggered anger and renewed fear over the country’s persistent gender-based violence crisis.
In a nationally televised address on Tuesday, Ramaphosa acknowledged that years of policies, legislation and government programmes had not done enough to keep women safe. His response goes beyond the investigation into the Ekurhuleni deaths, setting deadlines for reviewing unresolved cases, reducing forensic backlogs and identifying dangerous public spaces across South Africa.
Eleven deaths deepen national alarm
The latest body was discovered in Springs on Sunday, bringing to 11 the number of women found dead across Ekurhuleni, east of Johannesburg, since July.
The discoveries have steadily deepened public anxiety, particularly because several of the victims were young women and some were found in circumstances suggesting sexual violence.
Africa Briefing has followed the widening investigation from the discovery of seven women’s bodies in Ekurhuleni to the subsequent investigation into possible links between nine deaths as police intensified patrols and brought in specialist investigators.
The number has since risen to 11.
Despite widespread concern that the deaths could be the work of a serial killer, Ramaphosa stressed that investigators had not established that a single person was responsible.
According to the President’s address to the nation, a specialised multidisciplinary investigation has now been elevated to national level, bringing together detectives, crime intelligence officers, forensic specialists, investigative psychologists and digital investigators.
Four suspects have been arrested or are in custody in connection with three of the killings, while police continue examining the remaining cases.
‘The nation is angry. The women of South Africa are angry. Their anger is justified. I share that anger,’ Ramaphosa said.
Government admits response has fallen short
But the most striking part of Ramaphosa’s address was his acknowledgement that government action to date had failed to provide women with sufficient protection.
‘We must confront an uncomfortable truth. What we have done has not been enough. We need to do much more,’ he said.
Gender-based violence and femicide were classified as a national disaster in South Africa last year, allowing government to strengthen coordination and redirect resources towards the crisis.
Yet the continuing killings have renewed questions over how far those policies have translated into greater safety for women.
Ramaphosa said women should not encounter a criminal justice system in which forensic samples remain unprocessed, cases collapse because dockets disappear or survivors are turned away when they seek help.
That acknowledgement is significant because the new measures come with deadlines against which government performance can be measured.
Stalled cases face fresh scrutiny
Police and justice authorities have been ordered to undertake a national review of unresolved murders, attempted murders, rapes and serious sexual offences involving women and children.
Within 60 days, authorities must identify stalled cases, including those awaiting forensic evidence, investigations where suspects have been identified but not arrested and cases where police or prosecutorial action has been unreasonably delayed.
Within 90 days, priority cases must have individual recovery plans spelling out what remains to be done, who is responsible and when action should be completed.
Forensic authorities have separately been given 60 days to produce a funded plan for reducing evidence backlogs. Priority samples involving the rape or murder of women and children are to receive urgent processing.
The Inter-Ministerial Committee and National Council on Gender-Based Violence and Femicide must issue the first consolidated public progress report within 90 days. Further reports are expected every quarter, giving the public a clearer basis for judging whether the measures are being implemented.
Municipalities ordered to find danger zones
Ramaphosa is also shifting some responsibility for women’s safety beyond the police station.
Every municipality has been ordered to begin a women’s safety audit, working with provincial governments and police to identify places where poor infrastructure may increase vulnerability.
Within 60 days, councils must identify broken streetlights, abandoned buildings, overgrown public spaces, unsafe transport routes, poorly secured parks and other hazards.
The most urgent problems must then be addressed or included in funded implementation plans within 90 days of the audits being completed.
Crucially, the results are supposed to be made public.
That means residents should be able to see which dangers municipalities have identified, what has been repaired and what remains outstanding.
Alcohol enforcement also tightened
Government is also targeting alcohol-related violence.
Provincial and municipal authorities have been instructed to intensify enforcement against unlicensed liquor outlets and establishments operating outside permitted hours.
A broader legislative and enforcement package involving the trade, health, social development, police and cooperative governance ministries must reach Cabinet within 60 days.
Ramaphosa was careful not to blame alcohol for attacks on women.
‘Alcohol does not cause gender-based violence and it can never excuse it. Responsibility always lies with the perpetrator,’ he said, describing harmful alcohol use instead as an aggravating factor in interpersonal violence.
The wider challenge remains much harder than repairing streetlights or clearing abandoned spaces.
Ramaphosa cited a South African Medical Research Council study which found that more than 60 percent of women murdered in 2021 and 2022 were killed by an intimate partner, underscoring how often danger comes from someone a woman already knows.
His government has now attached deadlines, named responsibilities and promised public reporting.
For South African women, the measure of success will be simpler: whether those commitments make them safer in their homes, on public transport and in the streets where they live.
