- Seven years after promises, South Africa still has no functional GBVF Council.
- President Ramaphosa’s repeated promises remain unfulfilled amid worsening GBV and existing legislation.
- The DA will demand answers and action from the Minister.
Seven years after the first Presidential Summit on Gender-Based Violence in 2018, South Africa still has no functioning Gender-Based Violence and Femicide (GBVF) Council, despite repeated promises, signed legislation, and national commitments.
At the Portfolio Committee on Women, Youth, and Persons with Disabilities held on 17 June 2025, members expected a long-overdue briefing on the operationalisation and capacitation of the National GBVF Council. Instead, we were informed that there is no budget, not even to constitute a board.
This is an outrageous betrayal of victims and survivors. It is also a clear and devastating broken promise by President Cyril Ramaphosa, who announced the Council in 2022 during the second Presidential Summit on GBV. That Summit came in response to the brutal murders of Jesse Hess and Uyinene Mrwetyana, which had sparked the national #TotalShutdown movement.
In May 2024, the President signed the GBVF Council Bill into law, but a year later, the Council still exists only on paper.
Despite reaffirming his commitment in the 2025 State of the Nation Address, National Treasury has now confirmed that there is no funding available, not even to pay the board members of the Council. Civil society is instead being asked to work for free, even as they continue to carry the weight of this crisis on their own shoulders.
This is not just a delay, it is a dereliction of duty. Since 2022, South Africa has consistently reported between 9 000 and 12 000 rapes every quarter, with sexual assaults ranging from 1 000 to 2,000 each quarter. One in two women has experienced GBV in their lifetime. A woman is raped every 12 minutes in South Africa. We are losing this war and government is asleep at the wheel.
The DA has had enough of false promises, empty rhetoric, and political posturing. President Ramaphosa’s failure to launch the Council is a policy as well as a moral failure, and a betrayal of the millions of women who were told their pain would no longer be ignored.
When the Minister of Women, Youth, and Persons with Disabilities, Sindisiwe Chikunga, appears before the committee on 24 June 2025, the DA will demand answers and action. We further call on all national departments to immediately come to the table, unlock funding, and ensure the full operationalisation of the Council without further delay.