Cape Town – The former senior City of Cape Town official accused of rape appeared in the Mitchells Plain Magistrate’s Court on Thursday.
The 54-year-old Raphael Martin was arrested in June on charges of allegedly raping a 13-year-old Strandfontein girl over a period of three years.
According to National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) spokesperson Eric Ntabazalila, the accused appeared in court but the matter was postponed. The case will be handed over to the regional court.
“The case has been postponed until November 19 for a regional date,” Ntabazalila said.
According to Daily Voice, the victim, who alleged she had been raped and sodomised over a period of three years, said she did not speak out because she was afraid “there would be fights”.
But an incident that allegedly took place at her home two weeks before his arrest led her to break her silence.
The victim claimed the official came into the kitchen while she was busy drying dishes and forced himself on her, and that she stabbed him with a fork to free herself.
The official, who is said to be a former member of Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK), was branded an "enemy" of the armed wing after he was allegedly found to be an "agent" in the 1980s.
The Umkhonto we Sizwe Military Veterans Association national spokesperson Carl Niehaus previously said in a statement that the suspected official infiltrated the armed wing in the late 1980s but “he was exposed as an enemy agent and ostracised. From 1990 onwards all contact with him was severed.”
African News Agency (ANA)