By Fasuyi Tolulope Samuel
Women For Change, a South African advocacy group, is leading a campaign to prevent Chris Brown from performing in Johannesburg on December 14, 2024.
The non-profit organization, dedicated to addressing gender-based violence (GBV), launched a petition on October 2, 2024, urging the South African government and concert promoters to revoke Brown’s visa. Within just six days, the petition garnered over 10,000 signatures, closing in on its target of 15,000.
The petition emphasizes that allowing Brown to perform in South Africa, a country grappling with high rates of gender-based violence and femicide, sends a damaging message.
The timing of the concert, scheduled just after the global 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence, has intensified the group’s call to action. “Allowing a man with such a history of violence to perform in South Africa, a country grappling with one of the highest rates of GBV in the world, sends a harmful and dangerous message,” the organization stated.
Chris Brown’s history of violent behavior, particularly the highly publicized domestic assault of singer Rihanna in 2009, is central to the group’s concern. South Africa’s Women For Change argues that by allowing Brown to perform, the country is glorifying an individual with a record of abuse rather than standing in solidarity with survivors of violence.
Women For Change spokesperson Bulelwa Adonis addressed the backlash the group has faced, asserting that their activism is not selective. “We do not support people who are violent,” she said in an interview with Newzroom Afrika. “In this case, the fact that he obtained a visa to our country and the looseness in our system to allow him the accessibility to us is distressing and disheartening.”
As the petition continues to gather support, Women For Change is calling on both the government and concert organizers to reconsider their decision to host Brown in light of South Africa’s ongoing battle against gender-based violence.
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