SowetanLive reports that the Department of Justice and Correctional Services says the draft bill to decriminalise sex work (Decrim Bill) has not been canned but is in the process of being enhanced.

According to spokesperson Chrispin Phiri, absence of a framework to regulate the bill would make the Decrim Bill unconstitutional. He indicated: “We have been advised that without a regulatory framework we cannot go ahead with approving the bill as it would be unconstitutional and so that is what we will attending to. There will be a consultation process around what the regulatory framework should look like and then that will be added to the current bill; and so the bill has not been canned, it will be enhanced.” However, according to Sisonke National Sex Workers Movement, it has never received any communication about the decision to enhance the bill. “The movement maintains its dissatisfaction at the level of indecisiveness of the country's leadership in addressing the decriminalising of sex work in SA following justice and correctional service minister Ronald Lamola's decision to can the Decrim Bill,” said the organisation's Yonela Sinqu. It has been two decades since the call for the decriminalisation of sex work in SA and the organisation maintains that blatantly ignoring this call has cost the movement more lives at the hands of unscrupulous individuals posing as clients, while the criminalisation of sex work has also encouraged some police officials to sexually and physically abuse sex workers.

• Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Koena Mashale at SowetanLive

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