Gender based murder : how to stop it

 I do not accept the view that murder of a member of the opposite sex is in any way different from that of a member of one's own sex, such that murder of a woman by a man is now classified as a form of GBV. 

We have a serious problem of criminality in our country. A few months ago a man killed his mother with an axe; then traveled almost a thousand kilometers where he killed his ex girl friend, and was stopped before killing his sister in the same killing spree. A couple of weeks ago a man against whom a court had not only issued a restraining order, preventing him from coming anywhere near his "estranged" lover, but had even relocated him to his original village a hundred or so kilometers away, traveled back to the lover's village and hacked the lover to death with an axe IN FRONT OF THEIR CHILDREN, the youngest of whom is only a year old.

These acts of wanton murder point to a deeply seated malaise in our society. We need to find a long term solution to this criminality. Government should consult widely to find the long term solution. But we cannot wait for such consultation to take place while our mothers and sisters are being butchered almost every week. The immediate short term solution lies in us changing the laws NOW. Our courts nearly always find "extenuating circumstances" which let the murderer escape the noose where gender based murder is concerned. Fear of donors who constantly subject our countries to blackmail for practicing the death penalty no doubt contributes to the court's leniency. This must stop.

Let's face it, unless a person might die if they don't kill the opponent, then no death of any party should occur. In my view this should be the ONLY extenuating circumstance recognized by law. In other words such excuses as "she insulted me; she was sleeping with another man who threatened me; etc" should not be countenanced by a court unless the perpetrator can prove that all avenues of his possible escape had been blocked and that unless he killed the girl friend, he was likely to get killed himself. In this regard a judgment by High Court Judge Mpaphi Phumaphi as he then was, which freed a man from the gallows because the victim he killed had picked up stones to throw at the accused, was correct in my opinion. 

In almost all gender based murders, not only was the murderer under no threat of death, but the victim did not even have anything with which she could defend herself, and yet the courts somehow end up finding extenuating circumstances why the poor woman was killed. This must stop immediately; we must kill the killers even as we continue to consult widely to find long term solutions to violence in our society.