SA halts sex work prosecutions pending ruling

Sex workers in South Africa will no longer be prosecuted, pending the outcome of a case launched by sex workers challenging the criminalisation of sex work, according to a new directive issued by the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA). After years of consultations, the draft Bill to decriminalise sex work was withdrawn to be redrafted in 2023. Two years later, in June this year, Sex Workers Education and Advocacy Taskforce (SWEAT) called on the Department of Justice to prioritise the ‘long-delayed’ Bill, notes GroundUp. In October last year, the organisation launched legal action against the Minister and DG of Justice & Constitutional Development, the National Director of Public Prosecutions and the City of Cape Town. Recently the Western Cape High Court ruled that dozens of organisation could join the case as amici curiae or as respondents opposing the application. The NPA has stopped prosecutions while the court process plays out. NPA spokesperson Mthunzi Mhaga said: ‘While a formal ‘moratorium’ has not been declared in the legislative sense, a directive has been issued within the NPA in line with current legal and parliamentary developments.’

Prosecutors have been instructed not to enroll new cases relating to sections in the the Sexual Offences Act and the Criminal Law (Sexual Offences and Related Matters) Amendment Act, he said. Mhaga said this means ‘no new cases should be enrolled under the impugned provisions’, and where cases have already been enrolled, charges should be withdrawn. The cases where the accused has already pleaded are to be postponed pending the outcome of the court case. With regards to arrests and prosecution going forward, if sex workers are arrested during this period, those charges will not be enrolled by prosecutors, and existing enrolled matters will ‘either be withdrawn or held in abeyance’ until the court makes its ruling. ‘This approach reflects both the current legal trajectory and the constitutional obligations on the NPA to act in accordance with evolving jurisprudence and human rights considerations,’ said Mhaga. SWEAT said despite the moratorium, in August sex workers were still arrested in Cape Town, but charges were withdrawn, GroundUp reports.

Full GroundUp report