Reformed abuser tells of mom’s hell
“I learnt my abusive ways at the hands of my stepfather”
For six years Tumelo Mabena of Soshanguve, north of Pretoria, watched as his stepfather abused his mother. But now, Mabena is helping other men to stop abusing women.
Mabena’s journey to rehabilitate other men came after his own experience as an abuser, once spent two weeks in jail for assaulting the mother of his child.
He is now a programme facilitator at Heavenly Defence Form Ministry, a non-governmental organisation (NGO) in Soshanguve, where he is helping both men and women to reform.
He said his abusive behaviour drew roots from growing up watching his stepfather beating up his mother. “I would beat my girlfriend in front of everyone and pull her hair. I would shout at everyone that I paid for her hairdo. When we fought, I would go to her parents’ house and smash the windows.
“I once kidnapped my threeyear-old child from the mother. She opened an assault case but we bought the docket and the case didn’t go anywhere.”
Mabena said he wished he could undo the abuse he meted out to all his lovers.
He told Sowetan how he helplessly watched his stepfather throwing everything he came across in the house at his mother as he assaulted her.
“I started staying with my stepfather when I was nine. At the time my mother was the sole provider in the house.
He would beat her up for switching the TV set on or dishing out food to me. He was not even hiding his cheating ways, and when she confronted him he would beat her up until the neighbours came to intervene.”
A self-confessed former shoplifter and business robber, Mabena said after his mother was diagnosed with a chronic disease his stepfather moved out of the house, leaving his bedridden mother in his care.
Mabena looked after his mother until she died. After that he was very angry and took out all his frustration on the women he dated.
He said the turning point came when he went to an initiation school in Mpumalanga, where he said he was taught self-discipline and respect for women and children.
Mabena later met representatives from Brother for Life, an NGO that promotes positive behaviour among men. After graduating from initiation school, Mabena returned to Soshanguve where he joined a Brother for Life support group.