4.3 MAIN FINDINGS
4.3.8 Reducing Intimate Partner Violence
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the procedure to report partner abuse was slow and ineffective; they would rather go to the police. The police were trusted more to handle their cases than the university authorities were. Reporting involved going through a string of authorities in an orderly manner: RA, House Comm, RMS, Security guards, and eventually management. Management only handled cases that had gone through the other officials first and failed,they did not entertain first time reports. Sometimes cases of IPV were not entertained because female students would at times withdraw complaints or go against the rules and be seen with their partners again despite having been told not to do so. This may be the reason why some authorities took some IPV cases lightly.
Akala and Divala (2016) argue that gender issues are given less urgency in higher education since they are downgraded to private spaces where family, feelings, nurturance and relationships „belong‟. It is also worth noting that students need not go through certain challenges first hand to know about them, word of mouth is highly influential in distributing news about university issues among students. Others hesitate to report because they have heard that the university does not help students. The prevalence of IPV may, therefore, remain unknown due to such irregularities. The next theme discusses the participants‟ suggestions for reducing IPV.
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face if they abuse anyone because they expect everyone to be well accommodated at res.” –Sammy
“I think the university should organise an IPV awareness campaign for women.
They should also put programmes in place especially for information about how to go about when you have been abused. We are always told we should report such things but we have no idea where to report.” -Samkelo
Some solutions focused on educating men about gender. The participants felt that the male students‟ treatment of girls on campus was negative and abusive hence, they needed lessons on how to treat women well and with dignity. For example:
“I think that our male students have no knowledge about how to treat women.
Shortly I wish that the university could invite someone to come and address our male students about how to treat women.” -Khazimula
“I think boys should be mentored. The girls need someone who will teach them how to conduct themselves as women. We need someone who will guide us as to who we are because up until now I always address myself by my past.” –Imani Others focused on the empowerment of women. Also, Focus Group 3‟s reasons for intervention on women empowerment were based on the understanding that they did not know what to do, they were afraid of their partners and depended on them for survival.
“The solution is women empowerment where women should be told things.”
–Zethu
Others focused on how students, in general, could get involved in reducing IPV on campus:
“If I hear something bad happening in my neighbour's room, I think one should help because you end up being affected by what is happening.” –Angel
“I think you should sit them down (neighbours) and advise them that one day the person abusing you can kill you.” –Zama
All the participants indicated that there was a need for reducing IPV at residences. In all the focus groups, the participants mostly highlighted that women needed to be guided, mentored, and empowered about who they were and how to stand up for themselves and to stop addressing themselves by their past.
Similarly, during the individual interviews, most participants suggested that the university should organise awareness campaigns against women abuse where both male and female students could attend and know when a relationship was no longer healthy. However, one
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of them felt that it would be pointless to have awareness campaigns because “if you love each other you love each other”. This goes back to the first theme „Violence demonstrates love‟ where participants highlighted that no matter how severe abuse could be among partners when you love each other you stay in that relationship. Even the security guards/RMS were aware of this trend of students getting back together after reporting IPV which could be the reason why they took students‟ issues lightly. Two participants suggested separate residences for male and female students; one participant said that there should be a „no male visitors rule‟, while the rest wanted security at residence entrance gates, cameras, and House Comm to deal only with students‟ personal problems.
Addressing IPV at universities is a challenge because of such reasons as the low rate of reporting it, not just at universities but South Africa as a whole. Machisa, Jewkes, Morna and Rama (2010) confirm that GBV in South Africa is normalised and underreported. The SAPS reported that one in 36 sexual assaults were reported in South Africa (Vetten, 2000).
Some participants stated that one of the reasons for not reporting IPV was because they were afraid of being laughed at by other students and that they often blamed themselves for initiating a conflict that often led to physical abuse. Participants were not even sure who to report to, should they encounter IPV. De Keseredy and Schwartz (1998) argue that the high prevalence of IPV and other GBV issues at university campuses is due to universities‟ low acknowledgement of women and the presence of gender disparity in student bodies. According to Vetten (2014), local intervention on IPV dates back as recent as 1993 when the Prevention of Family Violence Act was legislated as the first attempt to address domestic violence and rape between partners as a crime.
Vetten (2014) summarises that to combat domestic violence in South Africa; the policy brief recommends that:
1 Further research should be conducted on all forms of family violence in South Africa, especially the co-occurrence of child abuse with intimate partner violence. Services may need to be adapted to ensure they address the presence of both forms of violence in families.
2 The police should record the relationship between perpetrator and victim and report on this.
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3 Policies and programmes should be developed to address the economic drivers of domestic violence.
4 The state funding of services (including the provision of shelter) to the victims of abuse needs to be improved. Microfinance, along with the provision of long- term housing, could significantly assist abused women.
5 The feasibility of regulating the availability of alcohol should be examined.
In addressing sexual violence, the university under study has a Sexual Harassment Policy and Procedures that was established in 2004. In its preamble, the policy states: “The university is committed to providing a work and study environment that is free of any form of unfair discrimination or harassment. This includes any acts or threats that interfere with the performance at work or in study of any individual or group on account of race, gender, sex, pregnancy, marital status, family responsibility, ethnic or social origin, colour, sexual orientation, age, disability, religion, conscience, belief, political opinion, culture, language or birth (UKZN sexual harassment policy, 2004, p.2).” The university also has a Sexual Violence Awareness Campaign that was held at the Westville Campus earlier in 2016.
Students were empowered on how to protect themselves against sexual violence and where to get help with other domestic violence issues. Student Support Services is still to host this campaign at other UKZN campuses (www.ukzn.ac.za). The obvious intent of these prevention and awareness programmes is to raise awareness regarding partner violence, sexual assault, and other issues of student safety to empower students and to ensure that they are knowledgeable about procedures and resources to eventually address and reduce IPV on campuses.
The participants noted that it was such campaigns that they needed to be empowered as vulnerable people in the university context. However, such campaigns did not guarantee that GBV would disappear because firstly; it requires students themselves to go to the venue that will host them and if students do not want to go then there will be no change, secondly; even after attending such campaigns there is no guarantee of any change if the perpetrator does not accept that he/she has a problem, their change of attitude about perpetrating violence is key to reducing IPV. Public perceptions and attitudes shape the social environment in which such violence takes place and either propagate or prevent its occurrence. A significant reduction of IPV cannot be achieved without addressing societal
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attitudes leading to tolerance or justification of violence against women at the hands of an intimate partner.