South African lesbians fear corrective rape

The daily threat in the townships of South Africa has been grown to a very great extent and the Lesbian South Africans are living in a fear of rape and murder. It has been reported that, a number of women have faced death in such attacks and the number of victims were 31 in the last 10 years. The latest victim of series of violent attacks against the lesbians is Noxolo Nkosana, who is 23 years of age. While she returned from work one evening with her girlfriend, she was stabbed a stone’s throw from her home in Crossroads township, Cape Town. Two men started screaming insults, out of which one was living in her own community.

Ms. Nkosana stated that, the two men were walking behind, swearing and screaming at them, as well as insulting them with awkward words. She again added that, she was on the ground before she knew that a sharp knife had entered her back. She was then half conscious and felt like twice more the knife sink into her skin and sure that they would kill her. Noxolo Nogwaza, who was 24 years of age, was raped by eight men and murdered in Kwa Thema Township near Johannesburg, in the month of April. Her face and head were disfigured by stoning and she was stabbed several times with the broken glass. The attack on her is believed to have commenced as a case of what is known as “corrective rape”, in which the lesbians are raped by men. These men consider it as an attempt to ‘correct’ their sexual orientation. This practice appears to be at a very increased rate in South Africa. 

According to Ndumie Funda, the founder of Luleki Sizwe, which is a charity which helps women who have been raped in the Western Cape, more than 10 lesbians are raped per week on gang rape in Cape Town alone. And she adds that, many of these cases are reported as the victims are in fear that the police would laugh at them and the attackers would follow them. Hence these women suffer everything in silence. And again she said that, two people who reported such rape cases dropped their cases because of their treatment by the police.