SAfrican women fight for mini-skirt rights

The picket was staged near the Noord Street taxi rank where a young woman had her clothes torn off by taxi drivers and hawkers last month for showing too much skin.

Her assailants are said to have touched the woman's private parts while pouring alcohol over her head and calling her names.

The protesters, mostly women and many wearing miniskirts themselves, carried placards reading: "We love our miniskirts", and "We aren't road signs, you need to respect us".

Mpumi Ngidi, 26, said she was frequently harassed.

Harassment 'disturbingly common'

"If you are caught between the pavement and a stall and you cross a group of men, at least one in three will try to touch your boobs, your ass..." she told reporters.

"I don't wear miniskirts, I don't dress in a sexy way or dress up. It is partly a defence mechanism."

Taxi associations condemned last month's incident, which prompted several other women to come forward with similar harrowing stories.

But taxi driver Thulani Nhlapho said he and many colleagues believed that "if you are wearing a miniskirt, you give the impression you want to be raped. 

"You respect yourself when you wear a longer skirt," he said. "We respect women who respect themselves."

Passengers' buttocks fondled

Popular radio personality Redi Direko, herself abused in a taxi as a teenager, rejected such statements with contempt.

"We have babies who get raped, grandmothers who get raped. When I was assaulted, I was 13 and wearing a school uniform."

Ms Direko said it was disturbingly common for women to have their breasts and buttocks fondled on taxis.

"There is a lot of patriarchy. The expression of male sexuality is often violent, women have no negotiating power."

About 50,000 rapes are reported every year in South Africa, which has one of the world's highest violent crime rates, but activists say the numbers are hugely under-reported, and could amount to a million a year.