Justice Minister Ronald Lamola says the Thuthuzela Care Centres that have been set up across South Africa to provide services to victims of Gender-Based Violence (GBV) play a significant role in the prosecution and conviction of the perpetrators of these crimes.
The centres provide medical and psycho-social services to victims of GBV.
Lamola says the centres, which have been established across South Africa, are a gateway to justice for the victims. The centres provide services such as counselling and medical treatment to the victims.
He was speaking at the launch of a new Thuthuzela Care Centre at Victoria Hospital, in Wynberg.
“This is where the law, medicine and science converge. This gateway is exclusively for sexual offences, GBV matters and other related offences. It is an infrastructural response to access to justice challenges faced by the sexual offences survivors.”
Justice Minister Ronald Lamola says government is working with the private sector to roll-out the centres:
National Director of Public Prosecutions Shamila Batohi says the Thuthuzela Care Centres that have been established across South Africa to provide support to victims of Gender-Based Violence are playing a significant role in advancing the fight against GBV crimes in the country.
“It is a reality that all victims of crime will not receive justice, but we must try to ensure that we can increase that percentage and do whatever we can to support those victims so that they can become survivors and I’m really hoping that in the next five years at most we can have a TCC at all the SAPS stations so that we can ensure access to these services throughout our country, even in the most far flung and rural areas.”
FACILITY LAUNCH: Thuthuzela Care Centre at the Victoria Wynberg Hospital.
The TCC is a one-stop GBV centre which offers psycho-social support, medical treatment, and legal services on site. The Wynberg TCC is the 61st in SA, adding to the current seven in the Western Cape. pic.twitter.com/oaw38NkkGW
— NPASouthAfrica (@NPA_Prosecutes) August 31, 2022
Together with the new centre, the Western Cape now has eight Thuthuzela Care Centres in the province, while there are now a total of 61 of these centres that have been set up across the country.
