​The country has kicked off 16 days of No Violence against Women and Children campaign launched by the Ministry of Women and Children at Grace Bible Church in Soweto on Thursday, November 2021.
The Gauteng Department of Social Development held an awareness campaign to coincide with the start of this campaign. Managers came to work wearing orange-colored clothes.

The 16 Days of Activism against gender-based violence is an international campaign that challenges violence against women and young girls. This campaign is aiming at eliminating violence against women and children and runs every year from 25 November to 10 December encouraging women to speak up against all kinds of abuse.

The Gender, Youth, and Disability Mainstream Director, Leonie Van Der Merwe said focus for this year's campaign includes to "Orange the World", which aims to show solidarity with those against all forms of violence and discrimination against women and children, including femicide; corrective rape; and violence against women with disabilities.

Van der Merwe added that the issue of gender-based violence is a multifaceted and intersectional problem, as some women are more vulnerable than others. Women with disabilities are more likely to be abuse25 Npnd and may face more difficulty leaving these situations because their abusers are most likely the same person who takes care of them financially and physically. Furthermore, queer women are also more likely to experience abuse due to their sexual orientation being different from what is seen as acceptable in a patriarchal society.

The Chief Financial Officer Johann Strauss said the aim of the department was to make the awareness of 16 days of activism go beyond the time frame it is commemorated on.

"We want to make sure that there is awareness on a continuous basis, we also want to shift from just awareness to a more proactive approach. To promote a more active approach in the fight against gender-based violence the Department continuously looks at the gender response budget, making sure that enough funds are being allocated to the awareness of the issue and the protection of women and children at risk of the violence”, said Strauss.

Strauss also raised the importance of involving men and young boys in these awareness campaigns and also having campaigns that target the empowerment of young boys. He identified gender roles and patriarchal socialization as being one of the reasons young boys grow up to have sexist attitudes towards women and even commit violent acts against women.

To tackle these issues the Department and its stakeholders host men's forums and programs for young boys to engage in the discourse about combating violence in our homes, school, workplace and our communities, as well as to inspire them to be good examples of change within the community in order to build a world free of fear, in order to break the societal norm of how a man should behave, how men should treat women and that woman can also do what men can do vice versa in order to promote gender equality within our society.

On the 8th of December the departmental officials are expected to picket outside the departments head offices in Johannesburg in order to raise awareness about Gender- based violence from 11:00 am to 13:00pm. Officials will be requested to wear black and orange clothes in support of the 16 Days of Activism campaign.