One in three women worldwide experience sexual or physical violence in her lifetime, most often at the hands of an intimate partner.[1] Southern Africa is particularly affected by this crisis, with high rates of gender-based violence (GBV). While GBV impacts all segments of society, certain groups face greater risks and challenges in accessing protection and support. Indeed, disadvantaged and marginalised groups are especially vulnerable, with persons with disabilities facing disproportionately high risks of GBV: in low and middle-income countries, women with disabilities are two to four times more likely to experience intimate partner violence compared to women without disabilities.[2] Despite this heightened vulnerability, the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Member States lack specific measures addressing GBV against people with disabilities. This article explores how the SADC Protocol on Gender and Development could be leveraged to address GBV against persons with disabilities.

GBV Among Persons with Disabilities in SADC Countries

The SADC Protocol on Gender and Development defines GBV as:

“All acts perpetrated against women, men, girls and boys on the basis of their sex which cause or could cause them physical, sexual, psychological, emotional or economic harm, including the threat to take such acts, or to undertake the imposition of arbitrary restrictions on or deprivation of fundamental freedoms in private or public life in peace time and during situations of armed or other forms of conflict.”[3]

Persons with disabilities include “those who have long-term physical, mental, intellectual or sensory impairments which in interaction with various barriers may hinder their full and effective participation in society on an equal basis with others”.[4] Persons with disabilities – in all their diversity – are particularly at risk of experiencing GBV, especially women and girls due to the intersectionality of disability, gender inequality, and often poverty. Stigma, discrimination and social exclusion increase the vulnerability of women with disabilities, leading to low self-esteem that may also facilitate the acceptance of violence.[5] In 2016, the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women reported that South African women and girls with disabilities face heightened risks of experiencing sexual or domestic violence, due to “their low status in communities, their social isolation, their dependence on others and lack of knowledge about their rights” and she highlighted that children with disabilities are three to four times more likely to experience abuse than children without disabilities.[6]

GBV against persons with disabilities can take many forms, from common ones to which they are particularly vulnerable, such as child marriage, to specific forms that exploit the vulnerabilities associated with disability, including abuse by caregivers, such as denying basic necessities or deprivation of medication or assistive devices.[7]

Systematic Gaps in Responses to GBV Against Persons with Disabilities

Despite the heightened risk and vulnerability faced by persons with disabilities, the legislative and policy frameworks in SADC Member States do not sufficiently address GBV against them, both in general GBV measures, which often lack a disability perspective, and in disability-specific measures that fail to sufficiently address GBV. The lack of relevant targeted measures creates additional barriers for this group in accessing survivor support services and justice – on top of the already significant barriers faced by all victims of GBV. These barriers are physical, institutional, and attitudinal: in Malawi, women and girls with disabilities face physical obstacles in accessing police stations to file complaints, while at the community level, village heads often dismiss or ignore violence against them.[8] In several SADC countries, such as Zambia[9], Seychelles[10], and South Africa[11], shelters for survivors of GBV lack funding and equipment to accommodate persons with disabilities, concretely making these essential services inaccessible.

These barriers contribute to significant underreporting of violence against persons with disabilities and impede their access to justice: among others, accessibility issues combined with misconceptions about their ability to testify, remember events, and identify perpetrators may discourage them from seeking justice.[12] The lack of targeted measures for this group often leads to secondary victimisation, exacerbated by the fact that professionals are often not trained to deal with GBV cases involving persons with disabilities, revealing a critical gap in awareness-raising and capacity-building programs.

Leveraging the SADC Protocol

The legally binding SADC Protocol on Gender and Development, adopted in 2008 and revised in 2016, aims to empower women, eliminate discrimination, and achieve gender equality and equity through the development and implementation of gender-responsive legislation, policies, programmes, and projects (Article 3.1.a). This Protocol is not the ideal or perfect tool to address GBV against persons with disabilities, as it does not include any specific provisions on the matter, but some articles could be used as a framework to support progress and address the gaps identified above.

First, Article 9 of the Protocol specifically addresses persons with disabilities:

“State Parties shall, in accordance with the SADC Protocol on Health and other regional and international instruments relating to the protection and welfare of people with disabilities to which Member States are party, adopt legislation and related measures to protect persons with disabilities that take into account their particular vulnerabilities.”

This article recognises the specific needs of people with disabilities and requires Member States to protect them, naturally including protection against all forms of violence, including GBV. This article also references international instruments to which Member States are party: notably, all SADC Member States have ratified the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, which states in Article 16 that States Parties shall “take all measures to prevent all forms of exploitation, violence, and abuse.” This confirms the obligation of SADC Member States to implement measures to protect people with disabilities from GBV, in line with the commitments made under both the SADC Protocol and the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

More specifically, part VI of the Protocol, including Articles 20 to 25, is dedicated to GBV. Article 20.1 states that States Parties shall “enact and enforce legislation prohibiting all forms of gender-based violence; develop strategies to prevent and eliminate all harmful social and cultural practices […]”. While not explicitly mentioning persons with disabilities, part VI of the Protocol naturally includes all victims of GBV and, therefore, should be applied to protect persons with disabilities. Beyond this evident inclusion of persons with disabilities, Article 23 of the Protocol is particularly interesting. This article repeatedly uses the term “accessible” when discussing support services for GBV survivors: “accessible information on services available to survivors”; “accessible, effective and responsive police, prosecutorial, health, social welfare, and other services to redress cases of gender-based violence”; “accessible affordable and specialised legal services, including legal aid”. Whether explicitly intended to address the issue of accessibility for persons with disabilities or not, the emphasis on accessibility can take this meaning. Thus, this article can be interpreted as implying an obligation for Member States to ensure that services dedicated to GBV survivors are fully accessible to persons with disabilities, a standard that is often not met in SADC Member States.

SADC Members States therefore have a responsibility to implement specific legislations and measures to protect persons with disabilities from GBV. Merely mentioning persons with disabilities alongside other marginalised groups in GBV texts, as it is the case in the 2022 SADC Model Law (paragraphs 18 and 24), which seeks to guide Member States in developing effective policies and laws on GBV, and as is also often the case in national frameworks, is far from enough. For instance, while Botswana's policies and programmes often identify people with disabilities as a vulnerable group, they fail to explain the causes and specific nature of this vulnerability. This leads to persons with disabilities often being overlooked in implementation plans, resulting in a lack of practical actions to address their needs.[13]

Fighting GBV against persons with disabilities requires a comprehensive approach, including local and national programmes and cooperation with human rights organisations to raise awareness, build capacity and ensure concrete accessibility. SADC Member States can draw inspiration from numerous expert recommendations and successful projects, both globally and within Africa, to implement disability-inclusive GBV prevention strategies.[14] However, properly addressing this issue cannot be achieved without engaging first with those directly affected as partners to precisely identify issues, root causes, and solutions, which should be developed with, and not only for, persons with disabilities. A participatory and inclusive approach along with comprehensive data collection and research should allow Member States to establish truly relevant measures, which should be allocated specific funds, action plans, and strategies to be correctly implemented, monitored, and evaluated.

Conclusion

GBV against persons with disabilities is not a fatality, and SADC Member States can and must take action to eliminate it. While the SADC Protocol on Gender and Development certainly does not provide a comprehensive framework to address the issue, it can be interpreted as a foundational step towards inclusive protection measures: the Protocol’s emphasis on accessibility offers a starting point for more targeted interventions. In any case, it is clear that SADC Member States must move beyond mere rhetoric and take meaningful action to prevent GBV against all groups and protect vulnerable populations effectively.

[1] World Health Organization. (2021). Global Factsheet: Violence Against Women Prevalence Estimates, 2018. url.

[2] Dunkle, K., van der Heijden, I., Stern, E., & Chirwa, E. (2018). Disability and Violence against Women and Girls: Emerging Evidence from the What Works to Prevent Violence against Women and Girls Programme. UK Aid. url.

[3] Article 1.2 of the SADC Protocol on Gender and Development.

[4] As defined in Article 1 of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (2006).

[5] Hanass-Hancock, J., Taukobong, D., Keakabetse, T., & Mthethwa, N. (2018). Preventing Violence against Women and Girls with Disabilities in Botswana. Situation Analysis. url.

[6] Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences. (2016). Report of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences on her mission to South Africa (A/HRC/32/42/Add.2). Human Rights Council. url.

[7] Regional Gender-Based Violence Working Group for East and Southern Africa. (2023). Gender-Based Violence and Disability Inclusion: Factsheet. url.

[8] Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. (2023). Concluding observations on the combined initial and second periodic reports of Malawi (CRPD/C/MWI/CO/1-2). url.

[9] Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. (2024). Concluding observations on the initial report of Zambia (CRPD/C/ZMB/CO/1). url.

[10] Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. (2018). Concluding observations on the initial report of Seychelles (CRPD/C/SYC/CO/1). url.

[11] Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences. (2016). Report of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences on her mission to South Africa (A/HRC/32/42/Add.2). Human Rights Council. url.

[12] Hanass-Hancock, J., Taukobong, D., Keakabetse, T., & Mthethwa, N. (2018). Preventing Violence against Women and Girls with Disabilities in Botswana. Situation Analysis. url.

[13] Hanass-Hancock, J., Taukobong, D., Keakabetse, T., & Mthethwa, N. (2018). Preventing Violence against Women and Girls with Disabilities in Botswana. Situation Analysis. url.

[14] For recommendations on GBV and disability in East and Southern Africa, see for instance Regional Gender-Based Violence Working Group for East and Southern Africa. (2023). Gender-Based Violence and Disability Inclusion: Factsheet. url. For recommendations on violence against girls with disabilities, see UNICEF, UN Women, WHO, ILO, FAO, UNDP, UNFPA, & UNPRPD. (2023). Working together to ensure the rights of girls with disabilities to live free from violence. United Nations Children’s Fund. url. For the Breaking the Silence approach in South Africa, see South African Medical Research Council. (n. d.). Breaking the Silence: Providing access to Comprehensive Sexuality Education and Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights to Young People with Disabilities in Southern and Eastern Africa. Retrieved on July 3, 2024, from url.