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Yvonne Wakefield launches The Warrior Project to help domestic abuse, gender-based violence victims

6 Aug 2019

Alongside Jackie Nagtegaal of LawForAll and Aisha Pandor of SweepSouth, Caveat Legal founder Yvonne Wakefield launched The Warrior Project at the start of Women's Month. The online portal offers information and resources to victims of domestic and gender-based violence.

Image credit: Becca Tapert on Unsplash.

The web-based service includes a free legal helpline managed by a women-only team at LawForAll along with links to the police; helplines and counselling services; as well as a list of shelters. Its associated social media sites also provide for sharing of stories to educate and inspire those in abusive relationships who feel alone and incapable of making a change.

This comes on the back of a spate of recent convictions of South African men for having murdered their wives.
Oldest sexual abuse case heads to trial this Women's Month 2 Aug 2019
Femicide capital of the worldGlobally, 39% of homicides of women are committed by an intimate partner. In SA that figure is 57%. “We have become the femicide capital of the world,” concluded Judge Gayaat Salie-Hlophe in the recent court judgment of S v Nobade (CC16/2018) [2019] ZAWCHC 76 (19 June 2019) at para 21.

“The statistics are frightening,” says Yvonne Wakefield, founder of The Warrior Project. “The problem of domestic abuse and gender-based violence in South Africa has reached massive proportions. It is now a crisis, and I could no longer look the other way.” 
 
 
 
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More than two thirds of all Women killed in Africa in 2017 were killed by intimate partners or family members. . . . 'UN Global Study on Homicide. Gender-related killing of women and girls". Pg 10
A post shared by  The Warrior Project SA (@thewarriorprojectsa) on Aug 5, 2019 at 1:03pm PDT
Female business leaders Nagtegaal and Pandor stepped up to collaborate, bringing their resources and commitment to the table. “It’s amazing how powerful ideological alignment between women on these issues can be,” says Wakefield. 
Facebook, Instagram and Nelson Mandela Foundation drive awareness about gender-based violence 29 Nov 2018
The Warrior Project was initially released to SweepSouth’s network and is now freely available to the public.

For more information, visit www.thewarriorproject.org.za. 