South Africa Team

Our partners in South Africa are SWEAT, Sisonke and North Star Alliance

 

SWEAT stands for the sex workers education and advocacy taskforce, they have a 20-year history in organising sex workers, advocating for and delivering services to South African Sex Workers. They have facilitated birth of two movements – a Pan African Alliance of sex workers (African Sex Worker Alliance) and a national movement of sex workers called Sisonke. ASWA is now an independent organisation based in Kenya, and Sisonke is moving towards its own independence in South Africa. 

 

Sisonke is a national movement of sex workers, established in 2003. The movement builds solidarity among sex workers through recruitment for membership and advocating for the decriminalisation of sex work in South Africa, the recognition of sex work as work, equal access to health services and human rights. Sisonke provides referrals for legal support and the movement through outreach programmes provides sex workers with condoms and IEC materials. With SWEAT, Sisonke offers a 24-hour free counselling and referral helpline, and trains sex workers on public speaking and human rights. 

 

North Star Alliance aims to provide quality healthcare to mobile workers and the communities they interact with. Under Handsoff, they provide health services to sex workers at Road Wellness Clinics along the transport corridor, and will continue to increase access to sex workers and build an inclusive, health-literate sex worker community.