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Mozambican man gets eight life terms for child rape – South Africa
2:54 CAT | 14 Jul 2018
Raul Balele in the Pretoria High Court.Picture: Independent Online
A Mozambican man who kept a 15-year-old girl locked up in his shack as a sex slave and repeatedly raped her and three other young girls was a disgrace to his family, the community and to other men, a high court judge said before sentencing him to eight life terms.
Sentencing Raul Balele (47) to life imprisonment on seven charges of rape and one of human trafficking, Judge Vincent Ratshibvumo said if there was any harsher sentence available, he would have imposed it.
“The accused is a disgrace to us as men because as a result of what he did children don’t trust us and run away when they see us, thinking it can be another Balele.
“…Word needs to go out … that life imprisonment will be imposed on anyone who does not respect the rights of our children,” the judge said.
A case was opened against Balele in 2015 after his then girlfriend caught him having sex with her 11-year-old daughter.
It then turned out that it wasn’t the first time he’d had sex with the child, who regarded him as a father, but he had done so on many occasions with her and two of her friends, then aged nine and seven.
The case was closed as he could not be traced, but he did not learn his lesson and hardly 10 months later trafficked a 15-year-old relative from Mozambique to come and stay with him as his sex slave.
He kept her captive and raped her on several occasions. She was already pregnant with his child when she managed to escape.
Judge Ratshibvumo said Balele had broken the trust of the girl who revered him as a father figure; he wondered how a man could be so desperate for sex that he broke his own relative’s virginity.
The emotional trauma Balele inflicted was permanent. To rub salt in the wound, he refused to let the girl have an abortion; she would now have to live with the consequences of the crime for the rest of her life.
The judge said it was unfortunate that some of Balele’s family members had blamed his victim and her mother for what he did to gratify his uncontrolled sexual desires. He could now no longer support them financially.
He said Balele had clearly preyed on children and society deserved an environment without criminals like him in it.
By Ilse de Lange ( The Citizen)
Court session report
The court said Raul Balele, 47, of Brits kept the 15-year-old locked up in his home and used her as a sex slave.
He admitted that he had sex with the young girl but said it was with her consent as her mother had “sold” her to him for R1500.
He claimed the teenager knew of the arrangement and that she was happy with it. He also had a child with her, although she was a relative.
But the girl earlier testified that she was told Balele phoned her mother in Mozambique and asked whether she could come and cook for him and he would pay for this service.
He paid her travel costs from Mozambique to South Africa and she was excited to come to the country.
When she arrived at his home in December 2015 he however, locked her in the house during the day while he was at work and took her SIM card so she could not contact her family. He then raped her several times.
She eventually managed to free herself and called the police.
Balele said it was practice in Mozambique to marry one’s close relatives and once a girl reached puberty it was practice in Mozambique to use her as a wife.
But the court rejected this and said he lived in South Africa, where this was against the law.
An 11-year-old, a few months prior to this, was also raped by Balele and she testified how he “used her as a wife”. Balele was caught red-handed when the child’s mother woke up one night and caught him on top of her.
The terrified child ran away and hid at a nearby dam. Community members found her, clad only in a shirt. The mother testified that the child was so traumatised about what happened to her that she was in tears each day. The mother had to take her out of school.
Balele said the mother lied about the rape because she wanted to get back at him for wanting to leave her. He said although they lived together at the time, they did not have sex for months because he was no longer interested in her.
The court rejected this version and questioned why he would stay with her for months if he wanted to break up.
The 11-year-old’s two friends, aged seven and 10, also testified how they were raped by Balele when they came to play with their friend at his home. All the children demonstrated to the court with the aid of an anatomically correct doll what happened to them.
Balele maintained that he was a good man and that he never touched the children.
By Elsa Venter (Independent Online)
Source: The Citizen
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