"We are concerned," said Mills to the Dispatchonline. "The problem is not the lack of policing, but a social-moral issue."

Mills said alcohol often contributed to rape as it made people more lax concerning their safety and surroundings.

The publication reported that the province was reeling from a spate of rapes on children at the weekend.

Police and communities reported four rape cases to the Daily Dispatch involving seven victims, six of them children aged between seven months and 15 years.

According to the SA Police Service’s latest crime statistics, 9380 sexual offences were reported in the province between April 2010 and March 2011.

While there were more sexual offences in Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal, the ratio of sexual offences to the population was second highest in the Eastern Cape at 139.1 per 100 000 people.