Fifty children raped every day in South Africa

Florence Panoussian:

That is according to the official figures, which specialist groups say grossly underestimate the true scale of the phenomenon depicted in police reports.

Regular police reports recount girls as young as five being raped, sometimes by boys who are barely in their teens.

South Africa is notorious for the number of rape cases and, according to Captain Percy Morokane, about 40% of the victims, or 20 000 a year, are under the age of 18.

But according to organisations such as Rape Crisis, the total of all rapes reported, more than 52 000 a year, is far from the real figure which they put at more than a million.

Luke Oambrecht, head of the Teddy Bear Clinic, part of Johannesburg's hospital service which treats young rape victims, says that 91% of perpetrators are people who know the child.

Of them, "about 20% are people acting in the capacity of father in other words, the mother's boyfriend, the mother's living partner, the stepfather, the biological father.

"And another 20% are juveniles under 18 years old, other children, which is another worry."

"We have younger and younger offenders," Oambrecht added.

"We have heard of seven-year-old boys who have attempted to sodomise other boys."

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