Cape Town – A 53-year-old man from Mozambique has been accused of deceiving a 15-year-old Mozambican girl into coming to South Africa under the pretense of a job opportunity, only to sexually assault her for several months.
According to Times Live, the man, who also hails from Mozambique, allegedly enticed the teenager by offering her a position at a spaza shop in Alexandra, Johannesburg, and claimed that his partially blind wife needed assistance with the business.
He convinced the victim’s family by promising to send them money every month, the report said.
“On arrival in Johannesburg the victim found there was no spaza shop and the suspect threatened her and forced himself on her between January and March 2023,” the report quoted Hawks spokesperson Colonel Philani Nkwalase as saying.
After enduring three months of abuse, the victim confided in a Mozambican woman working at a local supermarket about her ordeal.
The matter was then reported to the Hawks, and the victim was placed in a safe environment.
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In March, a KwaZulu-Natal man was sentenced to life imprisonment for rape after he posed as a traditional healer and raped a 17-year-old girl twice in April last year, News24 reported.
According to KZN National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) spokesperson Natasha Ramkisson-Kara, the man befriended the girl’s mother and pretended to be a traditional healer.
“From his frequent visits to them, he realised that the girl often got sick and would be taken to hospital. He [told] the mother that he [could] heal the girl with his traditional medicine so she [would not need to] go to the hospital. Her mother agreed to the proposal,” the report quoted Ramkisson-Kara as saying.
He fetched the girl from her home and told the mother that he would take her to a river for a cleansing ritual, and then have a prayer meeting with the other congregants.
The man, pretending to wait for other people to arrive, took her to his residence instead. Once there, he forcibly removed her clothes and sexually assaulted her on two occasions, finally letting her go in the early hours of the next day. Immediately after the incident, the girl informed her sister and mother, who promptly reported the matter to the police.
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Compiled by Betha Madhomu
