LACK OF ATTENTION TO OLDER CHILDREN AND ADULT WOMEN

South African government initiatives have tended to conflate the problems faced by women and children and hence to run together the solutions proposed to those problems. The summary of the National Crime Prevention Strategy, for example, lists one "priority crime" as "gender violence and crimes against children;" the specific initiatives described relate largely to children. Similarly, as noted above, the recent white paper on the health system does not separate women from mothers and children. Even those initiatives that appear to focus on women generally in practice are usually directed largely at young children: the Wynberg sexual offenses court, for example, has increasingly focused on cases of child sexual abuse; girls over fourteen and women are usually referred to the regular courts if they wish to pursue a case.126 Baragwanath medico-legal clinic similarly concentrates on cases of childabuse. There is a much stronger public consciousness of the problem of child abuse, reflected in the creation of specialized Child Protection Units within the police (of which there were thirty-five in May 1997, although their transformation into "FCS" units with a wider mandate is intended, as discussed above) and in legislation such as the Prevention of Family Violence Act, which provides for compulsory notification of the police if child abuse (but not rape of adult women) is suspected.127 As a consequence, pediatric cases are usually given much more attention than cases of rape or sexual assault of adults by medical, judicial, and police personnel; by the media; and by women themselves.

Without in any way wishing to deny the seriousness of child abuse cases or diminish the level of attention paid to them, Human Rights Watch believes the government should disaggregate the policy initiatives directed to gender violence generally and to violence against children. The problems faced by adult women and by children are different, and different approaches are needed to address them. Similarly, the problems faced by women because they are women are different from the problems faced by women if they are mothers. In the case of rape, the reported figures (while unreliable) indicate that teenagers and women under the age of twenty-five are most at risk; anecdotal evidence suggests that this group is also least likely to be focused on by special services and the most likely to be blamed for the violence to which they have been subjected (for wearing the wrong clothes, for example, or for being in the wrong places). A special initiative to assist these women and older children would be appropriate.