FREELANCE journalist Douglas Mthukwane has confessed to havi

• Author: Sandi Kwon Hoo
• Published date: 11 November 2022
• Publication title: Diamond Fields Advertiser

During proceedings in the Northern Cape High Court this week, Mthukwane said that he was falsely accused and was being subjected to “malicious prosecution”

“My name has been dragged through the mud for something I never did. Everything I worked for in the past 30 years for the freedom of the country was destroyed,” he told the court.

A bible that he carried onto the stand with him, came crashing to the ground when he demonstrated to the court how one of the complainants had twerked “her big buttocks” and rubbed up against him.

“My bible shakes the demons out of the State advocate. When they are out, then I will close it. The bible is food to my soul, it uplifts my spirits,” he stated during cross-examination.

Mthukwane told the court that his “spirits were free”, although at times he became “overwhelmed by the spirits” - where he muttered, burped under his breath, shook his head from side to side and placed his forefinger to his ear.

He stated that the allegations that he made use of a firearm were fabricated in order to portray him as a “serial rapist”, while he neither owned nor knew how to use a firearm.

According to the charges, the 14-year-old girl was threatened with a firearm and raped at Mthukwane’s flat after he had offered her a lift to school on May 30, 2016.

On August 20, 2017, he allegedly raped another woman at gunpoint after asking her for directions as she was on her way to a tuck shop.

The third complainant had requested Mthukwane’s assistance in drawing up her curriculum vitae in May 2019.

He told her that he had to fetch his laptop from his flat, after which they went to the shop to withdraw money.

Mthukwane bought her two bottles of beer whereupon they returned to the flat where he allegedly threatened and raped her.

After requesting the accused to stop to enable her to make use of the toilet, he allegedly threatened to throw her out of the window and he raped her for a second time.

Mthukwane explained that he had agreed to transport the child to school .

“She was struggling as the school was far from home and she did not have taxi fare. A family member cleaned my flat and did my laundry following the death of my wife in 2016. I told them that I do not receive my salary on a specific date as I am a freelance journalist.”

He said that he collected the girl on May 30, 2016, at around 7am.

“She came out of the shack and her hair was unkempt. She did not look as if she had taken a bath. Maybe she only wiped her face. There was also a...