Original Summary

'We are dying': Aunt of murdered woman pleads for action on femicide "What we are going to do, I have no idea," sobs Nokwanda Matshikiza, reflecting on the murder of her niece Dineo Motapane. "But something must give." "For us, for all the other women. How many other bodies will be found before something happens?" Nokwanda is speaking to the BBC from the family home near South Africa's main city, Johannesburg, just two days after relatives identified Dineo's body. The 38-year-old mother-of-two was last seen alive last Sunday. Her battered body, partly burned, found later in the residential region of Ekurhuleni. Nokwanda weeps as she describes how the family will have to face, at some point, the grim task of telling Dineo's daughter of her death. "How do you explain that your parent was brutally murdered, dumped in a field, and just left there, discarded like a piece of rubbish. "There's no coming to peace with it," she adds. "It's something that you can never reconcile yourself with, that you can never get over." Dineo's death this week has come amid a series of comparable incidents in Ekurhuleni – her body one of three discovered there this week. In total, nine bodies of murdered women have been found in similar circumstances in the region since July. The problem has always been there but this spate of grim discoveries has once again sparked a national outcry about the scale of violence against women in the country – which has one of the highest rates of gender-based violence in the world. Dineo Motapane / Dineo Motapane's body was "discarded like a piece of rubbish", her aunt said Themba Kekana is also living in shock at the death of a loved one. His sister, Itumeleng, was one of the first to disappear in Ekurhuleni. The 32-year-old shopkeeper's body was found in July, 17 days after she was last seen alive. Her body was badly bruised, partially clothed and dumped on a bridge. "We are devastated with grief," says Themba, wet eyes shining. "I look at my sister's young daughter and my eyes fill with tears, I know there is no way that I can ever take this pain away from her. "No family should have to deal with what we are faced with." Only one arrest has been made in connection with the murders – and that was two days after the first body was discovered on 15 July. Nobody has been detained following the murders of Itumeleng or Dineo or the other six Ekurhuleni women. Kekana family / Itumeleng Kekana's killing has left her young daughter without a mother Most of the victims were young, in their 20s or 30s, and almost all had suffered extreme violence before their deaths. Police have said they are not sure if they are hunting a serial killer. It is possible the cases are not linked. Either way, what has happened in this residential district east of South Africa's biggest city has traumatised the nation, shining a spotlight on a situation that many believe is a crisis. South Africa's police issue detailed crime statistics every quarter, which show that during the last quarter – between April and June this year - 5,427 people were murdered. The official data does not distinguish between the genders of the victims, but this week the country's Human Rights Commission released figures showing that 569 women had been killed in that period (six a day on average), with another 1,052 who faced attempted murder. Many women - already feeling unsafe - have been left reeling by recent events. And it has put pressure on the government, less than a year after ministers acknowledged the scale of the issue and declared gender-based violence a national disaster. Announcing the move last November, Minister of Social Development Nokuzola Sisisi Tolashe said treating the issue as a national disaster would help the government tackle the crisis. It followed weeks of protests, culminating in a "Women's Shut Down" march as South Africa hosted the G20 summit. This week has seen a chorus of calls for things to go further. Rights group Amnesty International said an important first step towards protecting South Africa's women was to recognise femicide as a separate crime. "Every day that femicide remains unrecognised as a crime is a failure to confront the targeted killing of women," said Amnesty's country director Shenilla Mohamed in a statement. "It is time to call it what it is: Femicide. "Femicide is a gender-motivated crime. It is the killing of a woman because she is a woman." Amnesty says femicide is criminalised as a specific crime in 33 countries, including Gabon and Morocco in Africa. It argues that making that change in South Africa could help focus on the scale of the issue. "It would compel the state to confront their failure to protect women and girls from violence," says Mohamed. "You cannot fix what you are not tracking." Almost everyone in South Africa agrees more needs to be done. President Cyril Ramaphosa this week pledged to leave "no stone unturned" in investigating the crimes in Ekurhuleni, adding: "As a nation, we must stand up for the rights, safety and dignity of women and girls." AFP via Getty Images / Activists held a demonstration when South Africa hosted G20 leaders last year Lebogang Ramofoko, an advocate for gender and social justice, said the levels of violence against women in the country were symptomatic of a much bigger problem – a lack of regard for humanity. "The bodies of black women have been treated as disposable in this country for time in memorial, passed down from colonisation through to apartheid," she tells the BBC, referring to the legalised system of racism that was in place until 1994. "What we see happening to women is testimony to legacies of violence from those systems whose traumas were never addressed. "This is not to say black men are inherently violent, but in systems where violence was meted out against them for decades, historically black women were the people that that violence would be taken out on - that cycle has not been broken." In Kempton Park, a district o

中文概览

中文标题： 南非接连发现被谋杀女性尸体，引发恐惧

南非埃库鲁莱尼地区自七月以来发现九具被谋杀女性尸体，本周就有三具。受害者多年轻，遭极端暴力。家属悲痛呼吁行动。官方数据显示四月至六月569名女性被杀，仅一起案件有人被捕，警方不确定是否为连环杀手。

  • 情报分类：综合情报
  • 分类依据：南非社会治安与性别暴力新闻，归综合。
  • 信息来源：英语新闻 / BBC News Top Stories
  • 发布时间：2026/9/19 07:04:41