findings are indicative of the experiences of Zimbabweans who are coming into South Africa,
particularly of many of those who are applying for political asylum, and serve to put to the test,
from the point of view of torture victims themselves, some of the existing findings on the
patterns of violence and torture in Zimbabwe.
The report presents findings derived from data pertaining to 267 Zimbabweans who sought
assistance from the ZTVP between January 2005 and April 2006. It provides a brief
demographic profile of clients, details about their experiences of violence and torture, as well as
the types of assistance rendered by the ZTVP. The data have been analyzed through the use of
SPSS (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences). Due to the size of the sample, the analysis is
based on basic frequencies and cross-tabulations of the data. Only statistically significant
findings are reported.
2
DEMOGRAPHIC PROFILE
2.1 Sex and age
The majority of clients assisted by the ZTVP were men (69%), while less than one third (31%)
were women.
Sex
Female
Male
Total
N
83
184
267
Mean
30.1
30.51
30.38
Median
29
30
30
Minimum
18
16
16
Maximum
53
66
66
Table 1: Age of ZTVP clients by sex
Regardless of sex, the average age of clients was 30 years; however, female clients assisted by
ZTVP tended to be slightly younger than male clients. Most clients fell within the economically
active population age group.
2.2 Marital status
Less than half of all clients (43% or 115 clients) indicated that they were married. Male clients
were significantly more likely than female clients to indicate that they were married.
4