Doing something: the initiation of sexual abuse services in Soweto

Abstract

In the early 1980s in Soweto, child sexual abuse was a little-known phenomenon. Moreover, due to apartheid policies, what services and facilities to deal with child sexual abuse were located exclusively in then-white Johannesburg and were relatively inaccessible to the black residents of the large township of Soweto located about 15 km south-west of the city. This chapter details the origins, history and workings of a community organisation that set out to address these deficits. This group would become affectionately known, both within and beyond Soweto, as the Bara/Soweto group, under "Mama Chrissie's" leadership.