Shebeens offer sex to keep the punters happy

Shebeen queens are selling their teenage daughters for sex to clients to improve business. This is according to the Deputy Minister of Social Development Hendrietta Bogopane-Zulu, who was speaking yesterday at the launch of a report that examined links between gender violence and HIV.

The department and non-profit organisation UNAids interviewed people in Limpopo, Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal to hear if cultural practices were increasing or eliminating the risk of HIV.

Shebeens offer sex to keep the punters happy

Bogopane-Zulu said she had been made aware of isolated cases where women were forcing their daughters into sex with regular shebeen customers. This was the enabling of rape, she said.

The deputy minister said through it was "not widespread", it was considered a "growing problem".

She said men buying sex often refused to use condoms, making women more vulnerable to HIV infection.

NGO Sustainable Livelihoods Foundation spokesman Thuli Ntshingila said the body had done extensive work with shebeens in eight informal settlements in three provinces over six years and had never heard of such a practice.

The Sustainable Livelihoods Foundation works to stop the portrayal of shebeens as places of alcohol abuse and violence.

Bogopane-Zulu said the research into the rural community in kwa-Bhaca, in Mount Frere, in the Eastern Cape, had uncovered family abuse of young girls in the traditional practice of virginity-testing.

There are currently five cases on the court roll in Mount Frere in which girls have accused relatives or neighbours of rape.