The protest is starting at the local Dawid Kruiper Municipality after the recent increase in the number of young girls being brutally murdered by their boyfriends in the Zfmgacu District, stretching from Springbok in Namakwa to Lenertsville and Keimoes. The 21-year-old Mercia Kotze became another femicide statistic when she died as a result of injuries sustained during an assault at the hand of the father of her four-month-old child on May 29th in Keimoes. 

The suspect appeared in the Keimoes Magistrate's Court on the 3rd of June and remains in custody whilst another girl was brutally murdered by her police officer boyfriend in Bergsig near Springbok. 

Esmeralda McKay from the government's Communications Department in Upington said this morning's #TotalShutdown, as well as #MyBodyNotYourCrimeScene and #24demands protests will commemorate the lives lost due to violence and urge men to respect women and children. 

The protest is set to start at the Dawid Kruiper Municipality at ten this morning and residents will be wearing black and red and hand over a memorandum to the newly elected mayor, Michael Segede.

OFM News/Roderick Titus