South Africa: Human Rights

Marginalised groups are the most affected by human rights violations. In the impoverished Northern Cape province, an inquiry concludes that the Khomani San community have been subjected to neglect and mistreatment by local authorities.

The Child Protection Unit of the South African police has reported a "radical rise" in violence against children. Over 40 children are raped each day, according to government figures. Human Rights Watch report that over 40% of rape and attempted rape victims are children.

"My excitement upon arriving at a weekend workshop of the Anti-Privatization Forum in South Africa and seeing a room filled with community activists - more than half of them women - was abated as the workshop progressed and I realized that most of the women were not participating." Alternatives intern Dawn Paley maps the reality that while Black women often dominate the membership of South African social movements, they remain deeply marginalized within them.

Emotions have boiled in leading East London after gay figure Mzukisi Mbondi was shot to death in Cape Town last weekend. Xhosa gay activists in the province have said that the sustained abuse and violence meted out to Xhosa gays had galvanised the gay community into forming the Gay and Lesbian Kei Movement.