survivors
Khadija Magardie
A joint venture between the private sector and the government to set up “one- stop”rape clinics across the country is floundering amid concerns that the government is not fulfilling its side of the deal.
The clinics are supposed to offer rape survivors medical treatment, counselling and facilities to make a police statement – all at once.
What was initially envisaged as a partnership between the government, NGOs and the private sector is proving an increasingly uneven relationship. While NGOs provide a free counselling service and the private sector has furnished the centres, the government is merely allowing them to set up shop in unused state premises and to make use of free, existing state resources.
The government provides medical attention and medication that it usually gives free to state patients. It does, however, provide training for councillors.
In his state of the nation address last year, President Thabo Mbeki promised that one-stop centres for abused women and children would be set up speedily, but a year down the line the project is still in a pilot stage and appears to be running largely thanks to the efforts of the NGOs involved.
In Parliament this month, Minister of Health Manto Tshabalala-Msimang admitted that the centres were still in the “planning” stage. This was in response to questions by the Democratic Party’s Sandy Kalyan on how much the government had budgeted for the centres. Tshabalala- Msimang’s written reply listed the various pilot centres – more than half of whose running costs are included in the overall hospital budget.
Though the centres are a move towards easing the survivors’ trauma by being more “user friendly”, the government has not earmarked separate resources to them.
The crisis centre at Leratong hospital in Kagiso, Gauteng, which has been running since September, caters for a large geographical zone reaching as far as Magaliesburg in the North-West province. Like other centres, it is run entirely by volunteers. It has a comfortable waiting room, a washing cubicle, examination room, counselling room and an overnight room for victims of domestic abuse. Everything, including a small kitchen for staff, was provided by a pharmaceutical company.
There is no in-house doctor – all the medical staff work on a part-time basis. Whenever a woman or child arrives, a doctor must be paged.
Though one centre, in Eldorado Park, is located adjacent to a police station, officers are not on the premises at all times at Leratong. Usually, a policeman brings the survivor to the centre, together with forms and a crime kit, which is later taken to a forensic laboratory. The woman still has to go to the nearest police station to make a statement prior to coming to the centre.
None of the centres have vehicles to be used specifically for ferrying the abuse survivors. At Leratong the policeman has to wait to take the survivor back home.
Faith Carson, a former nurse who heads the volunteer staff at Leratong, says the lack of adequate funding is making their work difficult. “Nobody is forcing us to be here – but we need funding to survive.”
There are always extra costs that they cannot meet. Though the staff are volunteers, and do not expect a salary, many say there are costs that the provision of a stipend, at least, could ease.
“We have to scrape together money to buy bread or coffee. Sometimes we do not even have taxi fare to come to work,” says one staff member.
“Sometimes, the policeman brings in the woman naked and bleeding, with nothing more than a sheet around her – we do not even have money to buy second-hand clothes to keep here for such times,” says Carson.
Last year, Carson sent a funding proposal to the Department of Health, but has received no response.
The department says it cannot devote separate resources to the centres. According to Dr Audrey Gale, deputy director of medico-legal services for the Gauteng provincial health department, the centres have to make do with already existing resources. She says that the burden of financing must rest equally with all service providers, in order for the project to be a success.
“Some of these organisations have already been doing this service for free anyway,” she said.