A walk to safer nights for women in Soweto
Nomsa Mazwai started an organisation, #FunkitimWalking, with the goal of making the streets of South Africa safe enough to walk at any time of the day.
One of the biggest fears for women and girls in Soweto is walking down the streets of most parts of Soweto in the evening as it has a bad reputation for high levels of violent crime, in an effort to bring that to an end, activist, Nomsa Mazwai started an organisation, #FunkitimWalking, with the goal of making the streets of South Africa safe enough to walk at any time of the day.
Telling women to avoid walking at night is not a solution, because some don’t even have a choice, think of all women who knock of late from work and arrive late at home, staying a few kilometers away from the bus stop or wherever they are dropped off.
On Saturday, September 5, #FunkItImWalking hosted a 5km evening walk, which kicked off around 6 pm at Inhlanzane Metrorail Station in Jabulani, to usher in spring, the season of renewal. The purpose of the walk according to Mazwai was to bring attention to the possibilities that exist for the community if it were safe enough to walk at night.
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“The walk went very well. We had participants from all over the city of Joburg and it was so lovely to walk in the evening and really enjoyed Soweto and the Soweto evening skyline. The distance was 5km in total and I think that if women could walk freely, they would walk all the time because Soweto is a perfect walking city,” Mazwai said.
“#FunkItImWalking had the first walk in Jabulani because there are so many lovely things to do in Jabulani and the surrounding areas in the evening. There is the Soweto Theatre, great restaurants, and pumping night clubs. These businesses would benefit greatly from a safer Jabulani. If people could walk freely and safely, local businesses would benefit as well as local home owners as the value of property benefits from safer communities,” she added
Asked how she thinks this could be made possible, Mazwai suggested more police visibility in the streets of Soweto.
“We need there to be visible policing, maybe that could mean police officers on bicycles in Soweto as Soweto is very flat and allows for law enforcement to use bicycles. We also need to ensure that the streets are clean and that the lights are working throughout Soweto.
“Sowetans need to take ownership of this city of ours, and demand #TheSowetoWeWant. We want safe communities, where a woman can walk at any time of day in any condition,” she concluded.
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