Samaritan to help eye-op girl
2004-10-11 20:18
Sekhukhune - An Mpumalanga teenager has undergone seven operations to reduce swelling on her eye, but to no avail.
Now, Kidibone Boko, 16, of Mamone village in Sekhukhune, Limpopo, is going to give it one more shot.
She and her mother, Kanyane, 42, flew to Tygerburg Hospital in Cape Town on Sunday with the help of an Mpumalanga businessman who has spent his own money in the past two years to help children who can't get proper treatment at rural hospitals.
"We are grateful to this businessman who has come all this way to help the poor child, because not even our premier has been able to help her," said one of her teachers at Ngwanatshwane High School, Lizzy Marishane.
Premier Sello Moloto met Kidibone when he was still the health MEC and promised to help her, but she didn't hear any more from him or the department.
The school raised money to cover Kidibone and her mother's transport costs to Johannesburg.
Badly disfigured boy
The businessman who is helping her does not want to be identified because "then everyone will come to my door as though I am a charity organisation".
He paid for reconstructive surgery for a 13-year-old Volksrust boy whose face was so badly disfigured that his eyes bulged out at the sides of his head and he had a gaping hole where his nose was meant to be.
He also has helped a 14-year-old girl from Pienaar near Nelspruit undergo reconstructive surgery to her leg, which grew to almost the same size as her body because she suffered from elephantiasis.
All the operations took place at Tygerburg Hospital.