Offers to help mother in court case

WHILE Eastern Cape social development MEC Nancy Sihlwayi warned people against donating funds for the mother of a 27-year-old rape victim, who is alleged to have killed one of the alleged perpetrators, more than R100 000 had been raised in a bid to help the mother with her court appearance yesterday.

R103 433.09 was donated by 158 people over six days on a generosity page set up by Cape Town resident Natalie Kendrick after she read about the mother’s legal woes.

The 56-year-old mother is alleged to have stabbed to death a man and wounded two others after she caught them apparently gang-raping her daughter at an unoccupied house in the Qumbu administrative area in Zwartwater near Komani last month.

She was arrested on R500 bail.

Her case touched many South Africans and non-government organisations (NGOs) who rallied behind her and offered financial, legal and psychological support.

But speaking to journalists outside the family’s one-room house this week, Sihlwayi said: “There is a government here which will work with the family through this.”

The MEC said they were keeping at a place of safety an 18-year-old girl who tried to commit suicide after she was allegedly victimised for telling the mother that her daughter was in danger. — and later released