Red Light 2010 - South Africa

Introduction

Southern Africa Network against Trafficking and Abuse of Children (SANTAC) was launched with the goal of protecting Southern Africa children from all types of abuse and trafficking for exploitation (child labour, commercial sexual exploitation, pornography, forced and early marriages, debt bondage, body organs extraction, illegal activities such as mendacity, drugs peddling, and others). In the commitment with these goals, SANTAC is aware and concerned with consequences in all the events that involve a huge number of people and resources.

The Women and Law in Southern Africa Research Trust - WLSA - is an action oriented research organization working in seven countries of Southern Africa: Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe. WLSA objective is to improve the legal status of women in Southern Africa.

The SANTAC and WLSA assist governments and other partners to understand the problem, to develop the necessary legal framework and commitment, and then to take direct action on the ground to prevent human trafficking and to find and rehabilitate the victims.

Red Light 2010 is an umbrella campaign network to connect organizations already working on the rights of women and children and preventing the violation of those rights as a result of trafficking activities. We aim to bring together women’s and children’s rights groups together for a common purpose to stop trafficking and associated gender based violence.

A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for the cooperation between WLSA and SANTAC on the Red Light campaign has been signed. This references the strengthening of the partnerships within the campaign and maps out the ways of working. This is further outlined in the segmentation approach to campaign delivery set out in the Red Light Campaign Regional Operational Plan. There will sometimes be joint activities between both agencies at the regional and national levels but WLSA and SANTAC will also operate individually under the campaign name but embracing the broad range of objectives in this strategy. WLSA will coordinate the Red Light campaign in Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe and SANTAC, in the other hand, will coordinate it in South Africa and at regional level.