Mom’s fear for woman held in Maputo
THE parents of a Port Elizabeth woman are desperately trying to find out why their daughter has been jailed in Mozambique for the past month.
The 33-year-old woman, whose parents do not want her named in case it jeopardises her safe return, was on her way from Ghana to Johannesburg earlier in May.
She stopped off in Mozambique on May 12 to take a connecting flight to South Africa when she was arrested in Maputo.
Further details around her arrest or what charges she faces are still unknown.
The family approached former Port Elizabeth lawyer, Mpumelelo “Bond” Nyoka, who flew to Pretoria on May 23 to meet officials from the Department of International Relations and Cooperation.
“At this stage, we don’t even know what she is charged with,” he said.
The woman’s 62-year-old mother, who also did not want to be named, said it had been a month-long nightmare.
“I can’t sleep. Every night I wake up and start walking towards the gate outside with the hope that my daughter will be there.”
She said her daughter had a threemonth-old child who would also not stop crying.
“The baby must know something is wrong. I am so stressed out. I do not know what else to do,” she said.
While in Pretoria, Nyoka said he had met department officials, who were not aware of the plight of the woman.
In an e-mail to Nyoka, assistant director for the consular geographical desk Ida Coetzee said the South African High Commission had contacted prison officials in Maputo who confirmed that the woman was in detention. “The prison officials indicated they will forward an official communication through the Mozambican foreign ministry soon,” Coetzee wrote.
“The SA High Commission will also request approval for a prison visit as soon as possible.”
Consular services chief director Steve Kruis said he had only become aware of the situation on Monday.
“We have requested our mission to communicate with the authorities to determine if they are aware of the matter,” he said.
“Once we receive the report we will have full understanding of what has transpired and will be able to plot the way forward.”
Nyoka played a pivotal role in the release of Vanessa Goosen, a former Miss SA finalist who was arrested at Bangkok Airport in 1994 with 2.7kg of heroin in her possession. She was released in 2010.