Nearly 140 Wits students attended the university’s largest self-defence seminar to date this week, as concerns about gender-based violence and personal safety continue to drive demand for practical self-defence training.
- Wits Tang Soo Do, Wits Boxing, Wits Karate and the Gender Equity Office collaborate to host its biggest self-defence seminar yet.
- The seminar sees attendance of male participants, highlighting how men can combat gender-based violence.
- Calls for Wits to help expand this initiative.
The seminar, organised by Wits Tang Soo Do, Boxing, and Karate, in collaboration with Wits Gender Equity Office (GEO), saw the number of attendees nearly tripling that of 2025.
The event happened over two days with August 4 reserved for women only, and August 6 for everyone.
39 094 contact crimes were reported between January 2026 and March 2026 according to South African Police Service in Gauteng.
Although 86% of the participants were women, the male participants also found the importance of attending this seminar. “It made me realise how easy it is to protect yourself in a fight and how to actually protect others if you ever in that situation” said participant Ayabonga Ndinga.
As gender-based violence and student safety concerns continue to remain a huge issue for the Wits community and South Africa at large, Lethabo Rabothata, the seminar organiser, saw the need to try and get Wits Tang Soo Do, Boxing and Karate together to exchange ideas on how students can defend themselves and hopefully save lives.
Rabothata highlighted the importance of male participation. “Where I’m from, GBV is crazy…Although, in terms of statistics, women are the most vulnerable in society…some men, when you get assaulted as a guy by a woman, it’s very hard for you to go out and say I was assaulted,” he said.
Recognising that men can also be victims of GBV, while encouraging them to safely intervene when witnessing violence against women, was one of the reasons the combat clubs partnered with the GEO. “If a woman is being assaulted, you need to be able to know what (to do), I can’t just sit and do nothing. I need to be able to step in and help” said Rabothata.
“We are grateful to have such initiatives taken by the Wits Sports in corelation [sic] with the GEO. We hope that it gets to increase every year, but the statistics of needing to defend yourself reduces,” Katlego Motaung, from the GEO, told Wits Vuvuzela.
Rabothata expressed that he hopes that Wits would join this initiative to help expand these self-defence classes to not only students, but staff and outsiders also.
FEATURED IMAGE: Reamogetse Molapisi, Chair of the Wits Boxing Club. Photo by Zebrena Ralph.
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