Nanzelelo Mhlanga, Intern, Security Sector Governance Programme, ISS
This month South Africa celebrates Women’s Month. In October this year the UN will also be celebrating ten years of the implementation of UN Security Council Resolution 1325 that calls for more women to be engaged in peacemaking, peacekeeping and peacebuilding.
The chilling account of the death of Akhona Geveza, a 19-year-old South African cadet with a desire to serve her country, who was found floating at sea after allegedly reporting being raped by her senior officer, starkly brings home both how far South Africa has come with gender transformation of the security sector, but also the perils of sending women out in these environments where the disjuncture between legal frameworks and practices are relatively un-policed. As South Africa celebrates Women’s Month, let us unpack the achievements and challenges of women in the security sector. Their achievements are an inspiration to the rest of the SADC region and we should draw lessons from them.
Post-1994 South Africa has seen an opening up of the security sector for women. Women constitute 24% of the SANDF. South Africa has 25 brigadier generals, one woman major general, a woman as Secretary for Defence and a woman as the Minister of Defence. South Africa’s police force has equally undergone major gender representation transformation, namely, 21% of its force is comprised of women and women serve in the top and senior management of the services, as provincial and deputy commissioners and station commanders. South Africa has one of the largest women peacekeeper contingents drawn from both the military and the police. Emphasis on getting the gender balance right has been accompanied by an equally vociferous attempt to create an enabling environment for women through gender mainstreaming policies. It is this security sector transformation process that has drawn more young women to the security sector. For example, there is the Transnet National Ports Authority’s Maritime Studies Programme, part of a campaign to encourage young women to become seafarers. Indeed, Geveza was one of 100 women enrolled in this course.
Geveza’s death at sea highlighted the challenges that women in the security sector, and beyond, still face, despite the marked progress that has been made. The bane of sexual harassment, stereotyping, and working environments that do not take into account the specific needs of women remain their realities. Women remain vulnerable!
South Africa, like most other countries has to answer the questions: How do we ensure that our legal frameworks and policies translate into changed behaviour and practice? How do we change mindsets? How can we protect women whom we send into these male-dominated environments?
The UN International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women contends that ‘the institutional costs of sexual harassment include loss of productivity, lowered morale, absence from work and increase in staff turnover. When personnel are gender-sensitive, the workplace becomes more productive, efficient and equitable.’ We therefore need to go beyond legal frameworks and engage in more effective gender awareness/sensitivity training and improve our monitoring and enforcement mechanisms in the security sector. When the attitudes begin to be transformed in the workplace, women will find it easier to work in these environments, thus including 50% of the human resources to create a more vibrant and productive security sector.
This National Women’s Day as we applaud the endeavours of women in South Africa we must also ensure that those women who have assumed the responsibility of protecting the nation are themselves safe enough to render protection to others. Geveza’s death highlights the dangers that women who enter these hyper-masculine environments in few numbers face. Therefore, as South Africa celebrates achievements we are alerted to the dire need to also examine the weaknesses in relation to the achievement of gender equality in the South African security sector institutions, so that we do not inadvertently promote women’s representation at the expense of their well-being. Representation, structures, processes, cultures and behaviour have to all change simultaneously to create environments for growth and prosperity for all. As a young woman I am inspired by the steps that have been taken to promote woman’s advancement both in South Africa and in the region. But, I am also aware of the gaps and that we as young woman need to be vigilant in maintaining hard won victories in the fight for gender equality and continue the campaign to meaningfully exercise the rights that we now have.
