There is a good reason SA’s Women’s Day is misaligned with the worldwide milestone celebrated in March.
It is a commemoration of a 1956 women’s march to the Union Buildings in Pretoria to protest against the introduction of pass laws targeting black women. The then-new apartheid government had wasted little time implementing some of the regime’s most vile laws, such as the Bantu Education Act and Immorality Act. The Group Areas Act of 1950 — the pass laws — was among them.
Amid a frenzy of somewhat irritating annual corporate and government virtue signalling and internal communications efforts to “celebrate” women, it is worth remembering that our Women’s Day is rooted in the broader struggle for justice in this country.
It is important to note that while enormous progress has been made on issues of gender fairness in SA, that the wholly serious root of the 1956 march of 20,000 women — gendered injustice — is not yet eradicated. It is reasonable to presume that march leaders Lilian Ngoyi, Helen Joseph and Rahima Moosa would be horrified at the propensity in this country to visit violence, prejudice and misogyny on its women and girls.
Women want to feel safe and to be taken seriously. That means not only inviting them on to your board, but also listening to what they say. And, like the men who donned aprons in 1956, it is incumbent on SA men to do more, with more intent, in ensuring that our mothers, daughters and colleagues are able to live their lives at work and at home to their full potential — in dignity and safety.
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