Her triumph over tragedy
FOR years Ines Antonio was abused by the people who were supposed to love her. This ended with a former lover pouring acid over her face when she no longer wanted to be in a relationship.
Now, Antonio is taking her pain and using it to assist other victims of abuse through her motivational speaking. She is also writing a book about her experiences that will be published later this year.
“The book is about my journey and all the abuse I have experienced in my life. From my stepmother’s hands to my brother and then my partner. It is about my recovery.”
Antonio, from Mozambique, said her mother died when she was young and her father remarried. “My stepmother never used to feed me. She used to tell my dad that I refused to eat her food. She locked me out and lied to my dad that I never wanted to be home. My dad always took her side and never believed me.”
Her father was exasperated with the constant fighting and sent her to stay with her brother in Joburg.
“He constantly said I was being ungrateful and did not appreciate the home he gave me. I was about 12 when I moved in with my brother. It was like being thrown in the lion’s den. He used to wake me up at 3am and make me polish the floors and wash his underwear and that of his girlfriend.
“I would be tired in the morning and when I was late he would beat me. He would kick me and punch me and throw me against the wall,” she sobbed.
Her brother eventually kicked her out of his house at midnight for refusing to bath his 12-year-old son. “We were the same age. I could not wash him. I got the beating of my life and he threw me out of the house,” she said.
Antonio was taken in by a neighbour. That was the first time she experienced any form of love and care. “It was nice. She looked after me like I was her sister. She was good to me.”
Antonio has never seen her brother since she moved out. “I don’t want to see him ever. I have forgiven him but I don’t want a relationship with him.”
Antonio sustained severe burns to her face and body when Jan Pieterse threw drain acid at her during a heated argument in November 2014.
She has undergone some 60 surgical procedures including skin grafts to her face and breasts, “eaten up” by the acid.
Pieterse is serving a 10-year sentence.
“Because of my stepmother’s abuse and my father not believing me about my brother’s abuse until the neighbour told him, I found it hard to talk about abuse. I then met Jan (Pieterse) who soon started abusing me too. I felt like I had a curse and didn’t deserve to be around people as no one loves me.
“Or, I thought, maybe I am the one who is doing something wrong for these people to treat me like this. What have I done? Am I not meant to not be on this Earth?
“I always took Jan’s abuse and stayed because of those feelings. When I first met him, he showed me so much love. When he started abusing me I started to blame myself,” a sobbing Antonio said.
But speaking to other women about her experiences is helping her deal with her pain. The suggestion to be a motivational speaker and to write about her experiences was from her counsellor.
“She has really been supportive. Every time I tell my story, I heal a bit and I also help someone get out of their pain.
“The aim was to make me feel better. It turns out that so many other women are going through the same things.”
Antonio, who was writing her final matric exams at the time of the attack three years ago, finally managed to get her matric in June and plans to study fashion design.
Antonio’s case also shows the lack of support abused women get from police. She had laid six charges of assault against Pieterse, and got a protection order, but despite this, police refused to investigate or arrest him.
During Pieterse’s court case, the police apologised for not assisting Antonio in time, but she refuses to forgive them. “Even when I got burnt, they closed my case about twice. It was opened when The Star printed a front page article with his photo and one of me swathed in bandages. A Star reader called in to say she had seen him, and he was later arrested. He was hiding in his father’s old-age home in Vereeniging.
“I won’t take their apology because the warning signs were there. The police could see me and my daughter on the floor crying. Instead of arresting him, they acted like counsellors. He would tell them: ‘I love her so much and I lost it,’ and they would encourage me to forgive him because we have a child together.
“What about me? What about what he did to me? Why are we ignoring that? And now they want me to forgive them. I won’t,” an angry Antonio said.
While picking up the pieces of her life, she also has to ensure that her daughter, 7, gets over the trauma. The daughter, who was present when Pieterse burnt Antonio, and also sustained minor burns from the acid splash, is terrified her father will be released from prison and hurt them again.
“She is very scared of him. She doesn’t want to see him. Every single night she asks God for a new daddy. She sometimes asks: ‘Mommy, is he still in jail? Will he come out?’ Then I have to keep reassuring her.”