Zuma shocked at Western Cape gang rape
2013-02-07 14:42
Johannesburg - President Jacob Zuma has expressed shock and outrage at the reported rape, mutilation and subsequent death of Western Cape teenager Anene Booysen.
The 17-year-old Bredasdorp girl was raped - possibly gang-raped. She was also disembowelled but was still alive when she was found. Before she died in hospital, she was able to name one of the men she said had attacked her.
Jonathan Quinton Davids, 22, appeared in the Bredasdorp Magistrate’s Court on Tuesday on charges of rape and murder.
Another suspect was arrested on Wednesday night, police said.
“The whole nation is outraged at this extreme violation and destruction of a young human life,” Zuma said in a statement on Thursday.
“This act is shocking, cruel and most inhumane. It has no place in our country. We must never allow ourselves to get used to these acts of base criminality to our women and children.”
The president called on the courts to “impose the harshest sentences on such crimes, as part of a concerted campaign to end this scourge in our society”.
Zuma also conveyed his deepest condolences to Anine’s family and vowed that government would never rest until the perpetrators and all those who rape and abuse women and children, are meted with the maximum justice that the law allows.
Meanwhile, the Congress of the People’s Beryl Ferguson said of the gang rape: “"This means that the department of women, children and people with disabilities, as well as the police and communities, have shown a total inability to deal with this problem in a decisive manner."
- SAPA
