Shelters for domestic violence victims hit by funding crisis

JENNIFER was 18 years old when she married Chris*. Soon after their marriage, he began to beat her and verbally and emotionally abuse her.

One night, in a drunken rage, Chris woke their sons, aged 12 and 13, at 3am and ordered them to light a fire for a braai. It was a bitterly cold night and the boys sat shivering, trying to light the fire while Jennifer tried to lull her husband back to sleep by gently stroking his head.

He fell asleep but awoke after an hour and shouted at the boys to get up and start the fire again. In a rage, he turned on Jennifer and began hitting her.

Jennifer’s eldest son grabbed a knife and shouted at his father “Tonight I am going to kill you and I don’t care if I go to jail for it!”

Jennifer knew that her turning point had come. She would not allow her son to rot in jail for punishing his father for years of abuse.

Taking the boys, she fled down the road in a see-through nightdress. She sought refuge at a shelter that night. Over the next three months she received counselling, found employment and left Chris.

Through the interventions offered by a shelter, she was able to turn her life around and begin the process of healing.

From September to December 2010, the police reported an estimated 35 495 cases of domestic violence to Parliament.

Due to under-reporting, this fig- ure is estimated to be higher. Shelter services fall under the ambit of the government’s Victim Empowerment Programme (VEP).

The VEP’s policy vision is to provide adequate service delivery interventions to support victims of violent crime. Yet in practice this is often far from the case.

The Heinrich Böll Foundation and Tshwaranang Legal Advocacy Centre, through a project funded by the EU, released this week the findings of a study conducted at three shelters for victims of domestic violence in the Western Cape: St Annes, the Saartjie Baartman Centre for Women and Children, and Sisters Incorporated. The research found that the Western Cape Department of Social Development provided a subsidy of just under R30 a day for each woman and each child that accompanies his or her mother to the shelter. This amount has since increased to about R33 a woman.

Most women who come to the shelters are poor with no place else to go and often bringing young children with them.

The shelters need to cater to the practical needs of these women and children. These include clothes, toiletries, food, health care, counselling and transport. The Department of Social Development in the Western Cape allocates a mere 1 percent of its total budget of R1.3 billion to the VEP.

In 2011/2012, the department had set a target of 3 091 women and children accessing VEP shelter services. An estimated 5 860 people used the shelters during this time.

In the 2011/2012 financial year, St Anne’s received a total of R451 642 in government funding, a mere 48 percent of its operating expenses. Sisters Incorporated received R285 600, less than a third of its operating costs, while the Saartjie Baartman Centre (SBC) ran at a deficit of R148 089. The SBC had to retrench staff to cut costs. Yet these shelters play a critical role in keeping many women and children safe from violence and are instrumental in getting them to a point of healing.

The study found that many women coming into shelters suffer from ailments such as depression, psychiatric conditions, HIV/Aids and substance abuse.

The victims of violence suffer a myriad health-related consequences and this, in turn, has many impacts on their lives, one of which is their ability to be at work on a regular basis and in a frame of mind where they are able to be productive.

In 2009, following public hearings on domestic violence, the national Department of Social Development made a commitment to set up two shelters annually in every province over five years.

It indicated that this was dependent on funding availability. No new shelters had been built during the time-frame of the research.

Many shelters are in funding crisis and the threat of closure is always real.

Ultimately, the reassessment of the support provided to shelters is a human rights issue. It is what is owed to women and children who bear the brunt of violence in the sanctity of their homes. It is time that we start counting the real, longterm costs of not providing adequate support and assistance to victims of domestic violence and the consequences of living in an endless cycle of horror and torment.

*Not their real names.

Watson is a feminist researcher with 19 years’ experience in feminist activism. Her areas of specialisation include women in politics, women and governance, violence against women and analysing public policy and spending from a feminist perspective.