Sawic renovates hospital’s centre for victims of abuse in KaBokweni
Minor renovations were done to restore dignity for victims of gender based violence.
The South African Women in Construction’s (Sawic) Mpumalanga chapter recently renovated the gender-based victims’ unit at Themba Hospital. The unit also received dignity pack donations. 
Thembeka Mnisi-Singwane, the chairperson of Sawic, explained that the organisation had been deeply alarmed by the previous state of the hospital’s Thuthuzela Care Centre, so they offered to do minor renovations to restore victims’ dignity. The victims’ reception room, waiting room and counselling room were upgraded.
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“The centre’s slogan is ‘Turning victims into survivors’ and that is exactly what we are promoting. We renovated the facility so that it is more welcoming to victims of gender-based violence. We want them to feel at ease and feel comfortable while reporting their issues to medical practitioners. We also want to encourage females to report such cases so that the perpetrators are dealt with and removed from the community,” Mnisi-Singwane said.
Sawic in partnership with Lindolwazi Trading donated sanitary pads to be used by girls and women accommodated at the facility. Soap, toothpaste and more were also donated. “The reason why we opted for this donation is because we want to make it more welcoming for victims to report their cases without any fear,” she said.
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The newly appointed CEO of the hospital, Dr Thembisile Matsinhe, was extremely grateful for this kind gesture. She said it had come just at the right time as the hospital was in need of these donated items.
Sawic was established to empower women to gain access to contracts, training, finance and networking in the construction industry. It is a Section 21 company, and was incorporated in 1999. As such, Sawic is owned by its members. The organisation has a national footprint in all nine provinces.
