Cultural, Religious and Linguistic Rights (CLR) Commission has raised concerns that religious leaders who work closely with children are not being vetted against the National Sex Offender Register.

The CRL Rights Commission has established a committee, comprising religious leaders, to investigate ongoing abuses in churches. This comes in response to complaints from congregants about various forms of abuse, including allegations of sexual misconduct by religious figures.

The CRL Rights Commission has set up a committee of religious leaders to investigate ongoing abuses in churches. The Section 22 committee will conduct extensive research in provinces on the abuse of congregants and the overall conduct of church leaders. pic.twitter.com/vn7lDqK81w

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“When you want to work with children in this country, whether a teacher or whatever, you go through a vetting process so that you are checked whether you’re not on the register of offenders, sexual offenders of children but with the religious leaders, they have access to children, but no one is vetting them. So, we are saying it’s another loophole in the system that this committee will advise the nation of how we going to make sure that everyone who is a religious leader, who then has contact with the children’s ministry, is then checked against the national register of offenders but beyond that be mandatory, so that nothing goes wrong with our children while they are in church” CRL Rights Commission Chairperson, Thoko Mkhwanazi-Xaluva elaborates.