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Bongiwe Nkomazana

How devastating is the death of Uyinene? For those who are not aware, Uyinene was a 19-year- old university student who was abducted, raped and murdered in Cape Town, South Africa. 

She made her way to the post office and was never heard from again. Her case went viral, with women all around Africa speaking up against violent acts against women. Unfortunately, it was not the first act of its kind and has not been the last. 

I believe what made it stand out, besides Uyinene’s friends and family who were relentless in their search, was the unanimous weariness of women. It just hit us different. 

The idea that women are not protected and nothing is stopping each and every one of us from being the next victim is terrifying and just leaves us powerless and hopeless. To imagine that Uyinene was going about her day and her life was taken away. 

To imagine how many Zimbabwean girls are at South African universities and at the University of Cape Town in particular going about their day too.

The world has become a scary place for females and South Africa in particular is not the safest place for a woman. According to statistics, a woman is murdered every three hours in South Africa. 

So just to put it into perspective, from about lunch time to the time we knock off, a woman is killed in South Africa. We grew up hearing and reading of the heinous things that were done to girls and women over there and shows like “Yizo Yizo” and “Soul City” potrayed that image. 

Over the years, it has become normal to hear that a girl is missing, a girl was raped, a wife is abused, a woman was found dead all at the hands of men. Uyinene’s murder just triggered all the heavy burdens that the women of South Africa and the world carry. 

There are feelings of extreme fear and anxiety whenever the sun rises and we need to make our way to work and school and whenever the sun sets and we need to head back home. The fear and anxiety that we have as we say our little prayers in our hearts to make it safely to our destinations is unspoken but the passing of Uyinene brought them to light.

Men are monsters. They are women’s number one enemy. Only women know how the heart comes up to the throat because of fear when they meet a man while walking alone. I took up the challenge of looking up some of the most gruesome acts done on women and who the perpetrators were and, of course, they were men. 

I do not understand where and what goes wrong in a man’s head for them to mastermind and execute some of these crimes. What is it that lacks in a man’s life that makes him wake up at the crack of dawn to hunt down a lady on a morning jog? 

What is it in a man’s head that makes him believe it is okay to rape a five year-old girl? Where does the love promised in front of God go when a man bashes his wife to death? Why should a man prey on a 19-year-old university student who has her whole life ahead of her and ends her life as if it’s nothing?

 Does it not register in man’s mind that these are lives and souls?

During the time of Nene’s passing, a gentleman I know spoke up and argued that Zimbabwean men are not trash because cases like this were rare in Zimbabwe. First of all, the fact that they are even there at all is disgusting. On one of my visits to Lupane, I got to chat with an official from the President’s Office over lunch. 

He explained that the rape cases in that area were insane. Young men are raping old women who reside by themselves, girls, whose parents are in the diaspora are being raped by their uncles and grandfathers who are supposed to be their custodians and young girls are raped during their long walk to school. 

Do you ever hear something that leaves you numb? That was me. I was baffled. These are all acts in one area that do not make it to the media but they occur. 

A study by the Ministry of Women Affairs, Gender and Community Development in conjunction with Gender Links revealed that at least 68 percent of women in Zimbabwe have suffered from gender-based violence (GBV) perpetrated by men. So there you have it, Zimbabwean men are trash too.

I remember travelling with my friend at the time and her dad for our Form One interviews. When we spent the night, naive me just got into bed with no care in the world. 

My friend, however, was very careful to lock our bedroom door and she kept checking that she had done so until I had to ask her why she was fussy about it. She told to me that her mom had explained to her that whenever she was alone with her father she needed to lock the door. 

At that time it was an “oh well” situation to me and I doubt my friend even fully understood the angle her mother was coming from. Today, I see how being a mother to a daughter has a daunting side to it. You can trust no man with your daughter, not even their father, sadly, sometimes. It is the men that we know, that we work with, go to church with and even sleep with that go and hurt women and girls.

 Rapists and murderers are walking among us and we are just not safe, whether we are right here in Zimbabwe or in the heart of crime in South Africa. Whether we will get to a point where women are safe, I have no idea. Until then we should take the precautions and I hope that as I list some of them all of us but men especially will see how absurd the situation is for women. 

Closing remarks to the women, never walk or jog alone, don’t reveal too much on social media, invest in pepper spray, having a tracking app on your phone that your friends and family can use to see your location, do not take isolated routes. To the men, leave women alone!