STATEMENT FROM THE INTERNATIONAL WOMENS DAY COORDINATING COMMITTEE -

Issued by The International Women's Day March Coordinating Committee

3 March 2000

Marching for a safer society

The International Womens Day March Co-ordinating Committee calls on all concerned women to join them in a march to end gun violence, Wednesday 8 March, 1pm, from the top of Kaizergracht Street, Cape Town.

Thousands of women from all over the Western Cape Province are expected to present a memorandum to Parliament in support of the Firearms Control Bill. We view this as an essential first step to ending violence in our society.

A wide range of women's organisations will participate in the march, including the ANC Women's League and the women's wing of other political parties, the Western Cape Network Against Violence Against Women, Gun Free SA, Illitha Labantu and other community and non-governmental organisations.

Representatives from the Western Cape Departments of Justice, Social Welfare and Safety and Security will also march in support of firearms control.

Women will march to show their strong support for the Firearms Control Bill:

• To increase control over who can get firearms licenses. Guns must no longer be be used as instruments for domestic violence and destruction
• To take licenses away from people who abuse their guns or use them carelessly. Guns should not fall into the hands of children. They should be taken away from people with drinking or drug problems or who have violent temperaments. Moreover, it should not be so easey for criminals to steal guns because they have not been stored safely or carried properly.
• To give police stronger powers to deal with illegal guns.
• To ensure that members of the olice, the defence force and security companies are prevented from using their guns in their private lives against neighbours or family members
• to create gun free zones in shebeens (where so much gun violence occurs) in hospitals and clinics (to protect our doctors and nurses) and in schools, libraries and creches to protect our children, our educators and our caregivers from unneccessary tragedy.

Say Kiki Rwexana of the ANC Women's League and Coordinator of the march: "We need gun free homes, gun free families, gun free schools, gun free streets, gun free neighbourhoods, gun free lives and a gun free South Africa.

"We need to demand safe havens, where women can raise their children, and where children can grow and play in peace.

"The Coordinating committee calls on all women in the Western Cape - from all backgrounds, from all political parties and from the city and the countryside - to unite in this call for an end to gun violence."

For further information or comment, contact Kiki Rwexwana, Coordinator:
082-658-6914 or (021) 696-7510.