South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has announced a national emergency response to gender-based violence after the bodies of 12 women — or at least 11, according to some reports — were found east of Johannesburg within the space of two months.

The deaths have sparked a national outcry over the scale of violence against women in a country that has one of the highest rates of gender-based violence in the world.

Ramaphosa addressed the nation on Tuesday evening, announcing a series of measures including mandatory safety audits of public spaces, plans to reduce alcohol-related violence, and a broader call for cultural change.

"There has understandably been widespread fear that the discovery of these women in close proximity could indicate the work of a single perpetrator," Ramaphosa said. "At present, the police have not found evidence establishing that these killings were committed by a single perpetrator."

Four arrests have been made so far.

Ramaphosa ordered every municipality to conduct a women's safety audit without delay. "High-risk areas must be identified" and addressed, he said.

"These audits must identify broken streetlights, overgrown public spaces, abandoned buildings, unsafe transport routes and facilities, poorly secured parks, and other conditions that place women at risk."

He also instructed ministers to draw up an enforcement package to reduce alcohol-related violence, while stressing that alcohol could never excuse such crimes.

"Alcohol does not cause gender-based violence and it can never excuse it. Responsibility always lies with the perpetrator," he said. "But harmful alcohol use is a significant aggravating factor in interpersonal violence, and it must be addressed as part of our wider prevention effort."

Ramaphosa admitted that the government had "not done enough" to protect women and girls in recent years, and said gender-based violence could not "be accepted as a normal part of life."

He argued that a deeper cultural shift was needed, beyond policing and legislation, saying violence against women "does not begin when a fist is raised" or when a woman is raped or murdered.

"It begins much earlier," he said. "It begins in attitudes that regard women as inferior… with the belief that a man has the right to control a woman."

"It begins when jealousy is mistaken for love, when control is mistaken for protection and coercion is mistaken for affection. It begins when a man refuses to accept the word no."

The president called on men and boys to take the lead in ending gender-based violence.

"We have placed the burden of male violence on women," Ramaphosa said. "That must change."

"The solution to violence against women cannot be to make women less free."

South Africa has one of the highest homicide rates in the world. Between April and June this year alone, 5,427 people were murdered, according to police statistics. Those figures do not differentiate victims by gender.

The South African Human Rights Commission reported separately that 569 women were killed and 1,052 others survived attempted murder during the same three-month period.