’I just can’t believe a man beat me up’ – EFF’s Sibongile Nkasayi seeks justice after Brackenfell attack

EFF member Sibongile Nkasayi Picture: Supplied

EFF member Sibongile Nkasayi Picture: Supplied

Published Nov 12, 2020

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Cape Town – Humiliated EFF member Sibongile Nkasayi still has to live with the uncertainty of whether the man who beat her with a baseball bat outside Brackenfell High School on Monday will face justice.

The burly man in a buff mask was urged that he should stop beating a woman because the media was there, Nkasayi said in an interview on Power987. She said his reply was: “She is nothing to me, she is k**.”

‘’I am still in shock. I just can’t believe that a man beat me up,“ Nkasayi said.

She is among six EFF protesters who have laid assault charges after they were attacked outside the school. Western Cape police spokesperson Sergeant Noloyiso Rwexana said on Thursday afternoon no further arrests have been made and the investigation is continuing.

Jaco Pretorius, 38, from Protea Heights, who allegedly fired an airgun during the clashes, appeared in the Kuils River Magistrate’s Court on Wednesday on charges of public violence. His case was postponed to January 25.

Nkasayi, who is consulting a doctor, told EWN: ’’I want him to be arrested and pay for what he did to me, the humiliation.’’

In the Power987 interview, she recalled how she came to fear for her life after arriving at the school to protest against alleged racism.

’’When we got out of the car, we were very peaceful. We walked towards the crowd and then people attacked all of a sudden.

‘’There was a guy next to me who told me, ‘You see, I told you I am going to get you’. That’s when the guy hit me with a baseball bat.’’

She said she recognised the face of the man who spoke to her from Friday’s protest outside the school, when they had a peaceful protest and were singing. “I think that’s where he marked my face,” she said.

Asked what went through her mind when she was being attacked, she said: ‘’At that moment I was shocked, scared. I didn’t know what was going to happen to me. I feared for my life.

’’The one who was beating told me that I must f****. I told him, ’don’t touch me, don’t touch me’. As he was pushing me, he hit me three times.

’’I heard a voice saying you can’t beat her the media is here, she’s a woman. He replied, ’she is nothing to me, she is k**’.

‘’The thing that I am being beaten up by a man as a woman was very scary. I thought I needed to get away here before I lose my life because those people were armed.

‘’I couldn’t turn and fight back because the whole crowd was going to come. That is why I continued walking.’’

Police Minister Bheki Cele said in Parliament on Wednesday that the police can’t be blamed for what occurred in Brackenfell on Monday, Netwerk24 reported. He was replying to a question by EFF MP Henry Shembeni about whether the police were still the first line of defence.

Probing Cele on what he was going to do about it, Shembeni said: ‘’What’s happening here is making a joke of us worldwide. And it’s just getting worse.

‘’What is the minister doing about all the racist incidents countrywide where people who are protesting peacefully are attacked. Even the police are being attacked.

According to Cele, schools and other relevant authorities should be addressing the issue, then the police can focus on their real job, especially in the Western Cape, where people are being mowed down and murdered.

‘’Schools aren’t military bases where we must deploy police officers to keep them safe. It therefore can’t only be the police who has to solve the problem and take all the blame.’’

Yesterday, pupils at Protea Heights Academy in Brackenfell had to be evacuated after the school received a bomb threat. Police and private security were called in after the school received news via e-mail of a possible bomb.

Police spokesperson Noloyiso Rwexana said that a bomb threat case has been opened for investigation.

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