REPUBLIC OF SOUTH AFRICA COMBINED SECOND PERIODIC REPORT UNDER THE AFRICAN CHARTER ON HUMAN AND PEOPLE`S RIGHTS and INITIAL REPORT UNDER THE PROTOCOL TO THE AFRICAN CHARTER ON THE RIGHTS OF WOMEN IN AFRICA strategies, plans, budgets and legislation to have an integrated, mainstreamed approach to eradicating sexual orientation-based violence. 99. The key motivations for the proposed changes to the law are included in a draft policy framework. At the moment, for the crimes of murder, assault and rape against specific persons or groups, the applicable law still provides for murder as murder and rape as rape and so forth. But is it important to stress that our courts are proactively, and even in the absence of specific hate crimes legislation, beginning to address hate crimes.317 100. In this regard, it is important to address the misconception that, in the absence of specific hate crimes legislation, those who commit hate crimes will get away with it. They do not get away with it - they still face the full might of the law. Our courts are, more and more, handing down appropriate sentences and where prejudice, hatred or bias is established, this is often found to be an aggravating factor, used to impose a harsher sentence. 101. The Department of Justice and Constitutional Development has made significant progress with a policy framework on combating hate crimes, hate speech and unfair discrimination. 102. The Department is envisaging a bill on the issue of hate crimes and it is in the early stages of being drafted. Sexual harassment 103. Sexual harassment is prohibited and punishable in South Africa. The Equality Act, 2000318 in section 11 prohibits harassment which is defined as ‘unwanted conduct which is persistent or serious and demeans, or humiliates or creates a hostile or intimidating environment or is calculated to induce submission by actual or threatened adverse consequences and which is related to (a) sex, gender or sexual orientation, or (b) a person’s membership or presumed membership of a group identified by one or more of the prohibited grounds or a characteristic associated with that group. The Equality Courts are thus empowered to deal with cases of sexual harassment. Sexual harassment in the workplace is prohibited under the Employment Equity Act, 1998319 and the Labour Relations Act, 1995.320 In this regard, the Code of Good Practice on the Handling of Sexual Harassment has been issued in terms of the Labour Relations Act, 1995.321 In schools, sexual 317 In the recent case involving the conviction and sentence of the man who murdered Duduzile Zozo, Judge Tshifiwa Maumela acknowledged the problem of hate-crimes in South Africa. He sentenced the man responsible for killing Duduzile Zozo, a young lesbian from Thokoza, to an effective 30 years in prison. Judge Maumela said a harsh sentence for the 23-year-old would serve as a warning to those who threatened the vulnerable and he told the perpetrator to reconsider his attitude towards gay people while he served his sentence. “Lead your life and let gays and lesbians be,” he said. 318 Act No. 4 of 2000 Act No. 55 of 1998 320 Act No. 66 of 1995 321 Act No. 66 of 1995 319 164