Humanity has come to a crossroads. COVID-19 not only managed to shutdown social life as we know it but exposed everything broken in our social system. At PLeace Awaken, from day one of the lockdown, we were raising awareness on the flaws brought to light and how to fix them. While we had hosted roundtables on the subjects of violence before 2020, the violence, especially against women, has risen in alarming speed, not only in the home and in communities, but also as a weapon of war as seen in the war on Ukraine and the latest Israel-Gaza conflict.

In South Africa in 2019/2020, a femicide was happening about every 4 hours and about 3,000 emergency calls for domestic violence a day were recorded, with about 137 casualties. Between March 2022 and 2023, about 53,500 sexual assaults and rapes were reported in South Africa. The dark figures of unreported and unrecorded cases are unknown. Femicide rates by intimate partners in this country are five times higher than the global average. The numbers of violent crime in South Africa: 73 murders and 170 rapes per day.

While the tourist hotspots, gated communities and estates are secured fairly well by private security companies, the residents of the rural townships and vast farms are increasingly falling victim to violent crimes, many of which go unsolved or unpunished, leaving the victims and their communities feeling helpless, vulnerable and abandoned. There is an urgent need for solutions that must transcend gender, race and political orientation.

The fifth of the UN's Sustainable Development Goals is to "Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls". Thanks to a couple of devoted activists and millions of brave women that came forward, the #MeToo movement gave momentum to the fight against sexual predators around the world. For the past five years, the main focus of all our PLeace Awaken campaigns and roundtable discussions was the rise of gender-based violence, especially during the Covid-19 pandemic. Response teams and educational programs are needed, laws need to be put in place and enforced more diligently.

Empoverished and undereducated communities need to be uplifted and their girls and women empowered. Education centers need to be erected, and sex, reproductive health and religious studies, included. Women must be given back control over their bodies and lives and the rights of girls protected at all cost. The activism against gender violence and for gender equality must continue, everyday until the goal is reached. We must come together as one Humanity.