South Africa

Hundreds of pregnant women and girls are dying needlessly in South Africa, partly because they fear their HIV status may be revealed if they access antenatal care services, according to a major report published by Amnesty International today.

Struggle for Maternal Health: Barriers to Antenatal Care in South Africa, details how fears over patient confidentiality and HIV testing, a lack of information and transport problems are contributing to hundreds of maternal deaths every year by acting as barriers to early antenatal care.

“It is unacceptable that pregnant women and girls are continuing to die in South Africa because they fear their HIV status will be revealed, or because of a lack of transport or basic health and sexuality education. This cannot continue,” said Salil Shetty, Amnesty International’s Secretary General.

“The South African government must ensure all departments work together to urgently address all the barriers that place the health of pregnant women and girls at risk,” said Salil Shetty.

Attacks on Somali-owned shops in and around Mamelodi township over the last six days have cost lives and livelihoods and are part of a disturbing trend of violence against refugees and migrants which the police and government are failing to address, Amnesty International said.

“Despite repeated calls, the police were slow to respond and failed to adequately deploy patrols to stop the escalation of violence which has so far left one refugee dead, ten others injured and at least 76 shops burnt or looted,” said Deprose Muchena, Amnesty International’s Regional Director for Southern Africa.

“These attacks are just the latest in a wave of ongoing and widespread violence targeted at refugees and migrants in South Africa. The fact that they were preventable highlights a pattern of inaction on the part of the police and a failure of political will in government to tackle this violence.”

The violence erupted on 7 June in Mamelodi, a township northeast of Pretoria. But despite the fact that police were informed soon after the violence started, they failed to respond appropriately and rapidly.

Allegations of abuse, including the use of electric shocks, against inmates in a privately run prison in South Africa raise serious questions about the authorities’ real commitment to tackle torture and other ill-treatment, Amnesty International said.

“Unfortunately, these recent allegations of abuse against inmates in South Africa’s Mangaung prison are consistent with a long-standing pattern across the country, including disturbing levels of impunity for human rights abuses within South Africa’s prisons,” said Mary Rayner, South Africa researcher at Amnesty International.

“That the South African authorities have reportedly launched an official investigation into the allegations is positive. The question now is whether they will actually bring those responsible to justice and provide full reparations to victims, as opposed to what has happened too many times in the past.”

Amnesty International will continue to monitor the follow-up to these investigations.

“Any investigation into the alleged abuses must be prompt, impartial and independent,” said Mary Rayner.

Homophobic attacks and harassment across sub-Saharan Africa are becoming more visible, indicating that homophobia is reaching dangerous levels, Amnesty International said today as it launched a comprehensive report documenting the discrimination faced by lesbian, gay, bisexual, transsexual and intersex (LGBTI) people on the continent.

Making Love a Crime: Criminalization of same-sex conduct in sub-Saharan Africa looks at how “homosexual acts” are being increasingly criminalized across Africa as a number of governments seek to impose draconian penalties or broaden the scope of existing laws, including by introducing the death penalty.

“These attacks – sometimes deadly - must be stopped. No one should be beaten or killed because of who they are attracted to or intimately involved with,” said Widney Brown, Amnesty International’s director of Law and Policy.

“In too many cases these attacks on individuals and groups are being fuelled by key politicians and religious leaders who should be using their position to fight discrimination and promote equality.”

Footage of South African police tying a Mozambican man to the back of a police vehicle and dragging him down the road has been making headlines across the world.

The man is reported to have died later in a police cell from head injuries.

“This footage is shocking,” said Noel Kututwa, Amnesty International’s southern Africa director.

“This appalling incident involving excessive force is the latest in an increasingly disturbing pattern of brutal police conduct in South Africa.”

Amnesty international has been documenting an increasing trend by police to resort to excessive force in response to social protests and ordinary crime for nearly ten years. Torture and other ill-treatment, primarily in context of criminal investigations, have become habitual practices. 

The killing by heavily armed police of 34 striking mine workers at Marikana last August, and the alleged ill-treatment of some injured and arrested miners in the aftermath, is one extremely concerning example of this trend.