accused
Stuart Hess
THE president of the South African Stop Child Abuse (Sasca) organisation, Tutu Mgulwa, will remain its head despite facing charges of rape.
Colleagues at the privately funded Sasca, as well as other anti-child abuse campaigners who have worked with Mgulwa, have offered their support, saying the charges were unfounded. They believe Mgulwa’s arrest is part of an elaborate scam aimed at discrediting him and his organisation.
Mgulwa was arrested on December 28 when an 18-year-old girl told the police he had raped her at his home in Jabulani, Soweto.
Mgulwa said he took the girl to his home after she claimed she had been raped by a taxi driver in Kwazulu-Natal while on her way to Johannesburg. ”She was very upset and needed a place to stay, so I offered to keep her at my house for the night,” he said.
”These are just trumped-up charges by groups trying to stop us from making a lot of noise about child abuse and child prostitution rings in Johannesburg,” said Glenys van Halter, co-ordinator for Children and Violence in South Africa, who has worked closely with Mgulwa. ”I wonder how much she is being paid for this?”
Van Halter said the police were angry with Mgulwa be-cause he continually ”showed them up. One subject that upset him was when suspected perpetrators were not prosecuted because of police incompetence.”
She said he also implicated people involved with the police in running child- prostitution rings in Johannesburg, which earned him the wrath of certain members of the police.
”He helped us tremendously and was one of the strongest lobbyists in the fight against child abuse,” she said, adding that Mgulwa was a tireless worker who was loved by all the children he helped.
Volunteers at Sasca said the organisation was receiving threatening phone calls from people whom they believe Mgulwa had implicated in child-prostitution rings.
Mgulwa, the 38-year-old father of three, launched Sasca in 1985 because of his concern about the number of child-abuse victims in Soweto. He worked on his own for the first five years but as the number of abused children increased he employed volunteers to assist him.
Sasca now has 10 volunteers, including five councillors. ”We need about R100 000 a year to run the organisation, and depend on donations from the community and large corporations,” said one staff member. ”For a non-profit organisation, getting this amount of money is difficult.”
Sasca also has six small branches outside Gauteng. The Johannesburg Metropolitan Council has donated a home to the organisation for the temporary housing of abused children.
Mgulwa appeared in court this week and was released on R2 000 bail.
He is to appear in court again on March 25.