Earlier this month, I got caught up in a traffic jam in Sandton. I was in my car on my way to an appointment. And the traffic had effectively halted. Progress involved inching forward, but with periods of no movement at all. I was on Grayston, coming up to Rivonia. And then I could see that people were blocking the intersection; people dressed in black. Cars ahead of me were squeezing themselves into the left-hand filter lane (which was not blocked), or U-turning right back down Grayston. Amazingly, for me, I had left early for my appointment, so I had time in hand. As I got closer, I saw that it was not people in general blocking the intersection; it was almost entirely young women, of all races and colours, many waving placards in several of the country’s official languages. I could only read those in English and Afrikaans. They were protesting against gender-based violence. Or, to put it more bluntly, rape and sexual assault of women and girls in the country. (Of course, men and boys can be raped and sexually assaulted, but these forms of violent crime are overwhelmingly directed against women and girls.)

There were hundreds of them – 200 . . . 300. They let some cars through, others not. There appeared to be no central direction. I was most annoyed not to see any Metro cops, to ensure safety for both protestors and drivers. I finally got up close to them, and saw how enthused they were; many appeared exhilarated by the act of messing up the schedules and disrupting the day of what they presumably imagined were rich and powerful men (of all colours). Frankly, I feared that their protest would be counterproductive (I think the later protest at the JSE definitely was), that it would annoy more than educate. I was certainly irritated, because I had to get to a medical appointment (nothing remotely life-threatening, I assure you). But I was not angry. I could not be angry. I supported them. I wanted to talk to them, but I couldn’t – that would have only made the traffic situation more dangerous. So I U-turned down Grayston and found another route to the hospital.

Let’s skip the officialese and the euphemisms; all too often, it seems women and girls are under attack in South Africa. Recorded sexual offences (most of which are rapes) in the recently released latest national annual crime statistics totalled 52 420, up 4.6% on the 50 108 recorded in last year’s report. The good news is that sexual offences uncovered by the police in their investigations jumped by 19% over the same period. The bad news is, in simple numbers, that means 7 976 were uncovered by the authorities, as against 6 701 in the previous report. And rape statistics are notoriously unreliable, as many women (and this applies worldwide) don’t report being raped. The crime is appallingly traumatic, but the reporting and the subsequent struggle for justice are also traumatic.

I want to be graphic, I want to use four-letter words, I want to shock you. But I can’t. This is not the place. And shock effects rapidly wear off. Perhaps a simple fact may help; I, myself, personally know two women who have been raped. Rape is, of course, a notoriously difficult crime to prosecute, unless everything has been done “by the book”. And that always depends on a traumatised woman remembering what the legal system needs her to do, straight after suffering such a terrible violation. Because, of course, the rights of the accused cannot be swept away. ‘Innocent until proven guilty’ has to remain the keystone of the legal system.

Even when everything does go well, the result can be demoralisingly inadequate. The South African Medical Research Council’s 2017 report ‘Rape Justice in South Africa’, established that only 11.8% of rapists were sentenced to life imprisonment, 64.4% were sentenced to more than ten years but less than life, and a shocking 23.8% (nearly one in four!) were sentenced to less than ten years. Remember, parole often significantly reduces the time actually served.

Until now – maybe things will change under President Cyril Ramaphosa – government and the ruling African National Congress have not taken the issue anywhere near seriously enough. That this has been so is clearly illustrated by the fact that its yearly campaign is officially titled ‘16 Days of Activism for No Violence Against Women and Children’. How inspiring! How that just rolls easily off the tongue! How incredibly motivating! Yes, I know that is enough sarcasm to sink the Titanic. But it deserves it. When something is really important to government, it gives it a snappy African-language title: Operation Phakisa, Thuma Mina, Kha ri Gude, and so on. And what did women get? A stultifying, pedantic, bureaucratic, stilted statement that a computer would have been ashamed to generate. I think it is significant that our current little feminine insurrection is happening now, pretty spontaneously, more than two months before government’s official campaign.

So, what is to be done? There need to be both short-term and long-term responses. Short-term responses are pretty obvious: more money for police units and prosecution teams dealing with sex crimes, allowing them to get the training, equipment and personnel they need. There is a point at which chucking money at a problem ceases to be effective, but we are currently a long way from that in South Africa when it comes to fighting rape and other sexual assaults. Heavier sentences would help, too. And may I suggest that those convicted of raping and then murdering a woman or a girl always get life without the possibility of parole?

As for the long term, that is much more difficult, requiring a lot of education and changing certain cultural assumptions. But it can be done. It has been done, elsewhere, and it can be done here. What is absolutely essential is the role of good men. Keep on setting the standard, guys. Do not compromise yourselves. Strong women and good men together, in the end, however long it takes, however agonisingly slow it seems, are invincible.