Finally. The country stopped. It stopped for seven-year-old #CweCwe. That’s not her name, obviously, we can’t have a raped seven-year old’s real name tied to the biggest story in South Africa. We can’t use her name because this story will be with her for her entire life even if it didn’t make the headlines. Justice will be relevant to our child in the future because for the first time, in a long time, South Africa put her foot down. ‘Wathint’ abafazi, wathint’ imbokodo’! #NOSAinSA
I’m Tonya Khoury, thanks for joining me as I scratch the surface of the media that made our hearts bleed this week.
On the subject of blood, I ended up in casualty with something I thought was minor that soon turned into something life threatening. But I’m fortunate and blessed because after a four-day hospital I was on the mend from what could have evolved into a medical horror story. Instead, the horror story unfolded in front of my media monitoring eyes. I’ve always been a fan of TikTok, but we have a rule at Acumen Media: we don’t participate in media we cannot monitor and TikTok had been a dead zone for a few months. Now it’s back in our offering and I’ve been back on the platform for two weeks. Today I have to report on me, myself and I because, largely due to TikTok, last week’s #ScratchTheSurface went viral. Over four hundred thousand video views between two videos on one platform alone. One of the videos claimed that the #CweCwe story had a lot of holes in it, and the other raised the fact that if you were an innocent person accused of being involved in hurting a child, you would have volunteered your DNA. It was the second one that was really went viral. South Africa agrees with me (If you accept that South Africa is TikTok). I was called a “gogo” which startled me at first, but then I realised I was in a place with a multitude of really young people, and I could actually be their gogo! I’m not a gogo though #DearTikTok, I’d prefer #OusTonya, but I’ll take what I’m given. I thank you for the love and the rage. I didn’t trend on Twitter, but there was a bubble of conversation where they had cut my video in half, leaving off the stats and key messaging and with selective editing. I was also told that I was old, fat, white and stupid. #DearTwitter, you’re so 2020 no-one plays with you anymore. I’ll admit it was a bad hair day and an unflattering camera angle, but “stupid” I am not (only when I talk about sport). #Facebook users shared the piece but not many comments, yet the content was enough for them to take action. That’s why I love Facebook.
After I had recovered from the sepsis, I needed a lift back to Sodwana, and although I had my car, the minor surgery on my foot meant I couldn’t drive. So, I called the man who runs shuttles in Sodwana, Mandla. He’s both an excellent driver and a great conversationalist. It’s not the first time that Mandla and I have chatted about politics and media mayhem, but this was a cracker. #ConversationsWithMandla. We spoke about the biggest story in South Africa, about the #GNU and more importantly about how to fix both issues. Trigger warning, you’re about to enter the chat.
No country in the world can demonstrate like South Africa. We are the boss of marches. Did you see those marches, the tiny tots in primary school with their small signs and the harsh warnings coming out of their sweet small mouths. It’s enough to either break your heart or draw you to rage. There is no middle ground here. The thing is, we both agreed, this rising of our nation is not really for #CweCwe only, it is for every child, either boy or girl, who has been hurt, raped or killed by the tyranny of South African men. #JusticeForVictims
We asked the question #DanCorder asked: what is wrong with the SA male DNA? Why are we the rape and child abuse capital of the world? There is not a single country that carries the statistics we carry. You can’t fix a problem until you understand why it exists. It’s impossible to justify this kind of behaviour, but there are certainly various contributing factors. Let’s look back over the years: man, woman and child were often crammed into one room. Having intimate relations definitely took place in front of the children and if those parents thought their kids were asleep every time, they were wrong. Add to this the very aggressive and far spreading network of booze in our country where you can find a Zamalek cheaper and quicker than you can find bread in South Africa. Now you add alcoholism to the fray. Chuck in a cheap set of nasty drugs like tik, extreme poverty and a history of violence and all these things become fire starters. Before you know it, the roof is on fire.
For good measure throw a few more things onto that tinderbox, for example a tolerant schooling system that allows pregnant children to attend school and then to collect a grant. The same girl child who has only unemployment to greet her once she’s left school, where the nation has set the precedent around her for a grant-based life. There is no incentive for SA to do better. None whatsoever. These horrible things are why we are witnessing South Africa’s #MeToo.
In one of my previous companies, I had been invited by the media to give a talk about GBV. It was #16Days of one of those impotent campaigns we do that makes you believe you contributed to the struggle, even if you do not. But anyway, I digress. I went to one of my departments, primarily run by women and asked them to help me with my upcoming speech. The things I learnt in that room were mind blowing. Out of the team of seven, four were raped before the age of nine. One girl said that she was fourteen when she learnt that her uncle raping her every night was not normal. Imagine you are one of those women today. They’re all watching this #CweCwe story unfold. You’re watching a kid that was sent to a school, a private school at that, and she was still raped, repeatedly. Every single one of those women in my team were reliving the experience they felt when they watched their television screens over the past few weeks. I hate to tell you but every single woman, young or old, has felt some sort of violence or sexual exploitation at the hands of men. Every. Single. One. Some just much less than others. #CweCwe’s mother herself was a rape victim. This is not a pandemic my readers, this is a genocide.
South Africa is quick to defend Gaza against a tyrant, but we won’t fix a genocide in our back yard. Women and kids are like coal fed to the steam train that rams its way through barricades, driving over the hearts of at least half the nation without an end in sight.
#Mandla and I don’t do idle banter, we talk about what we need to do to fix what can be fixed. Some may call me radical or totalitarian or even an instigator because of what I’m about to say, but remember this is a state of national emergency, this is a genocide. This extraordinary state of terror calls for extraordinary measures. They locked us up in 2020. They locked us up to shove a jova in our arms for a Covid vaccine. We all queued up and nodded, even smiled as they shoved foreign liquids into our bodies. Now I am asking for the same cohesion. All South Africans must submit their DNA and the next rape, the very next rape, we’ll see justice kick into action. The second thing we need to circumvent is this bribery story. We need to remove the middlemen who are filled with randalla eyes and greasy palms making dockets disappear and cops look away. We, South Africa, should know exactly where that person is, and we should be able to watch every minute of the court proceedings.
We demand, and I mean this, we demand that the #SexOffendersRegister be opened immediately and that all school teachers are vetted right now. There are at least eight educators in the system today that are wanted for sex crimes against children. Why are they still employed? Why are we even having this conversation about them?
Then, bring back referendums. Make them electronic. The #GNU is not working, “national unity” will manipulate anything. We are tired of dirty politicians, let us use our democratic right the way it was intended, majority rules. If you had put out a referendum asking if we should we open the sex offender’s register, it would have been open already, there is no question. If we can vote for #BigBrother contestants or for any other big corporate competition, why can’t we use our cell phones to do the same thing when it comes to things that really matter. #ElectronicInstantReferendums
You want to put VAT up? Ok ask us, give us a choice: either put the VAT up, or remove the SRD grant, or put up income tax. The nation will speak and if there is less than a seventy percent majority; we need you to ask us different questions. Questions like what to do with those tax evaders earning six digits and more per year. This is not hard; this is what Mandela intended. What we see today was never our dream. We are tired of #SAinSA. And who made #SexualAssault #SA? We will not be dialed down. It’s child molestation, it’s child rape. Call it the disgusting names it deserves. Do not mute us!
Don’t tell me we can’t do it, we absolutely can and if there is a better idea than this, shout it from the rooftops so we can hear it. We should be taking extraordinary steps to stop our #ChildGenocide. Our schooling is to blame too. You cannot expect a thirty percent pass rate to create functioning adults. Our dirty secret has been leaked. It’s not a drip; it’s a tsunami and we are tired of our children getting death sentences. You have so many children that have suffered some kind of abuse during these early formative years, things will only get worse. We need to act.
I wish I could tell you that I had read the news, so you didn’t have to, but I didn’t. I was over medicated and dealing with fleeting TikTok virality. I know there was one story after another after another about the carnage of our children. I know the GNU is legless. I know that Trump painted the stock markets red, and I know that Gaza and the West Bank are being obliterated, regardless of who opposes Netanyahu. So, I’m going to end with this #StopAllGenocides I’m Tonya Khoury and thank you for scratching the surface with me, Acumen Media and Mandla.
