Women for Change, a South African women’s rights organization, launched a petition calling for the cancellation of Grammy-winning artist Chris Brown’s December 2024 Johannesburg performances due to his history of domestic abuse. The change.org petition, which surfaced on Oct. 2, 2024, asks concert promoters and the government to “reconsider” allowing Brown to perform at the FNB Stadium, the largest stadium in Africa, where over 94,000 tickets sold out in less than two hours. The controversy reflects growing concerns over gender-based violence (GBV) in South Africa.
According to the BBC, South Africa is grappling with some of the highest rates of femicide and GBV in the world. A rape is reported every 12 minutes, and a woman is murdered every three hours, often by an intimate partner. Statistics show that between 25% and 40% of South African women have experienced sexual or physical intimate partner violence (IPV) in their lifetime.
Women for Change highlights Brown’s 2009 felony conviction for assaulting fellow artist Rihanna, as a symbolic issue in the ongoing struggle for women’s rights. They argue that allowing such a public figure with a history of abuse to perform in South Africa sends the wrong message to survivors of violence.
Speaking to CDI, Siki Dlanga, project leader for The Evangelical Alliance of South Africa (TEASA) on GBV, commented: “There has been much criticism regarding the response to stop Chris Brown from performing in SA given that there are other SA celebrities who have not been held accountable by the public such as Somizi. This is how SA social media users who support Chris Brown chose to respond. The fact of the matter is that the campaign to stop Chris Brown is an important call to stop normalising GBV.”
Dlanga, who is also a renowned author and poet, notes that whether Brown ends up performing or not, the awareness campaign on GBV will have achieved something important – a national conversation about the state of GBV in SA. She added, “It has also exposed why GBV continues, as women and men continue to participate in a culture that is still willing to dance to the tunes of an unapologetic abuser.”
In an Oct. 17, 2024 Business Live piece, columnist Chris Roper highlighted a provocative comparison made by fellow columnist Fred Khumalo in City Press. Khumalo wrote, “Michael Jackson was accused of paedophilia – but where would pop music be without his contribution?”
Khumalo used this argument to defend fans of Brown, urging critics not to condemn them solely because of Brown’s domestic violence conviction. However, Roper pointed out the problematic nature of the word “but” in these discussions. He stressed that for groups like Women for Change and survivors of gender-based violence (GBV), “there is no ‘but’ in GBV.”
TEASA has been actively involved in efforts to combat GBV, emphasizing the theological imperative for Christians to stand against all forms of violence. In 2021, TEASA released a statement on GBV, expressing deep concern over the church’s failure to adequately address the issue. Their statement lamented the reality that GBV exists even within Christian communities, undermining the Church’s witness to the world.
TEASA’s statement also outlines a plan for churches to be “salt and light” in society, drawing from the biblical commandment to love one’s neighbour as oneself (Matthew 22:37–39). The alliance acknowledges that while many women in South Africa endure violent rape, beatings, and economic exploitation, the Church has often taken a “band-aid approach” to what is a systemic issue. TEASA has argued that the Church must first confess its own failings and turn to God’s enabling power to transform both its internal culture and external witness.
“Faith without action is hypocritical,” read TEASA’s statement. It included calls on churches to commit to changing beliefs and behaviours that devalue women, to preach that “women’s lives matter,” and to ensure that churches are safe spaces for women.
While the petition continues to gain signatures, the broader conversation remains: how can South Africa, a nation with some of the highest GBV rates globally, confront the normalization of violence in its culture? For advocates like Women for Change, the concert is an opportunity to remind the world that South Africa’s women deserve safety, dignity, and justice.
