- Tebogo Lerole and Kwela Tebza started the Mzansi Act Now campaign in 2020 after the murder of Tshegofatso Pule.
- Their campaign has encouraged survivors of GBV to come forward.
- Tebogo believes the lack of positive male role models for boys is the catalyst for GBV.
It’s no secret that gender-based violence and femicide (GBVF) in South Africa runs rampant.
At least one in three women experience physical, sexual, psychological or financial abuse at some stage in their lives, with intimate partner violence reported as the most common.
GBV affects all members of society but women and children seem to bare the brunt of the abuse.
What can men do to stand up against and condemn the violence that so many of their brothers perpetuate?
This is why Afro-blues group Kwela Tebza have been committed to stand in the gap tackling this dire issue with their campaign Mzansi Act Now.
Group member Tebogo Lerole explains to TRUELOVE how growing up in Soweto, having their platform in the entertainment industry and the highly publicised murder of Tshegofatso Pule sparked him and his brothers to give back to their communities and fight the scourge against GBV and femicide.
“What also pushed us was when the young lady by the name of uTshegofatso Pule was murdered. Mpho, our elder brother, then brought forward the matter to say, ‘Guys, we need to do something about these killings, we need to do something about the scourge on GBVF’.
“It cannot be so that we grew up from the township and when we were growing up, we never had incidents where you’d find that a young person has killed a young lady or raped a young lady.”
Getting Mzansi to act now
Since 2020, Tebogo and his brother took on the mantle of standing up against this frightening issue through community awareness events like their third annual hike against GBVF and fun day picnic on 13 April 2024.
Speaking on the kind of impact he’s noticed since spearheading the campaign, Tebogo says, “We noticed a lot of foundations coming up or muscling up or being set up, which is a sign of positivity. It simply means that there are many ears that are hearing the cause to saving people or to fighting the epidemic.
"And then, secondly, we also realised that a lot of young people wanted to be a part of this cause and to fight GBVF and apart from just having women as the forefront or as the frontline of the war, we now had a lot of men actually setting up their own foundations and doing activations and coming up to want to speak. But as well, I also believe that we also empowered quite a lot of victims that are survivors or victims of GBVF because we now started getting a lot of cases and people coming to report their cases.”
READ MORE | When I left | 3 women share their brave stories of GBV
Absent fathers at the crux of toxic behaviours
A common theme that comes up when asked about what men can do to tackle the toxic masculinity that often breeds gender-based violence is the staggering occurrence of absent fathers in the country.
Statistics show that 42 percent of children live only with their mothers while only 4 percent of children live only with their fathers, showing just how prevalent the lack of male role models for young people is.
“In this day of today, we’ve got children that are literally bringing up other kids or children fathering children,” Tebogo laments.
“We’ve got absent fathers, we’ve got women dying from femicide and we’ve got kids that are growing up without proper guidance from their families. We’ve got broken families as a Black society being that family nucleus is something we don’t have as part of our morality in the country anymore or as a people.”
READ MORE | GBV continues to plague our society - 'I existed purely for a stranger’s sexual pleasure'
Rhythm City and Blood Diamond actor Mduduzi Mabaso reiterates this sentiment, sharing with us how men don’t have enough role models who teach them how to be a good man.
“I always say, as men, we’re never given a template of how to treat a woman. We learn it from the street, we learn it from other people that we look upon and say, ‘ah, this is a good man and I think I want to be like that man’. But to find out he has hid a lot of things that are bad and when they appear those things, then we realise actually that is not the man that I want to be. And our role models, man, they are something else. They are playing a lion or a wolf in a sheep’s skin.”
Men need to take a stand
Tebogo says a way to battle the unhealthy behaviours of men and build the decaying moral fibre is the creation of programs or men’s forums to give out positive teachings and learn from the toxic past of patriarchy in the country.
“We need to champion programmes where we set up behavioural change methods to guide men, to help men. We just need to keep on going on with these programs and never end or never stop mentoring. Find young boys, mentor them. Find community heroes, find community leaders that can instill positive programmes amongst our youth and amongst our men in South Africa.”
Tebogo still believes there is a long way to go, especially with the challenge of getting government and corporations to help with resources to educate people in South Africa and lead the cause against GBVF.
