Second woman claims sports boss raped her says Jennifer Ferguson

19 October 2017 - 12:24 By Angela Daniels
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Jennifer Ferguson. File photo.
Jennifer Ferguson. File photo.
Image: Gallo Images / City Press / Lucky Nxumalo

Another woman has accused a top sports administrator of raping her‚ according to singer and former MP Jennifer Ferguson.

Ferguson said the woman reached out to her after the singer revealed the alleged crime on social media on Wednesday.

 

“Just yesterday I got a message from somebody who experienced the same thing with him‚" Ferguson said.

“I don’t know if she will be ready to disclose … a relative of somebody in a very high position. It’s a big step to step out.”

Speaking via Skype from her home in Sweden this morning it is clear that Ferguson’s decision to share her alleged rape at the hands of the well-known sports administrator has both liberated and exhausted her.

“There is something in South Africa where the wounded male psyche is expressing itself violently.”

South Africa‚ she said‚ had a long and disturbing history of rape and abuse stretching as far back as colonialism.“The history of abuse is appalling. We’ve had a scourge of rape and child abuse since our colonial landings.”

“Urgent reflection has to be undertaken. For me personally to disclose has been not only my healing… I feel I am part of a much bigger collective need for truth in order to heal and forgive‚” she said.

Despite repeated requests for comment the famous sports administrator has not yet made a statement on the allegations.

Ferguson took to social media yesterday writing a heartrending account of her alleged rape at the Holiday Inn on the Port Elizabeth beachfront.

Almost 24 years ago‚ she wrote‚ the “pleasant and entertaining” man asked her to join him for a drink after a performance she had given at the hotel.

“I accepted his invitation to join him for a drink at the bar‚ but said I needed to go up to my suite and change from my performance dress.

“He joined me in the lift and said he would wait for me. I felt a little uneasy as he entered my suite‚ but I beckoned him into the lounge and asked him to wait there while I changed.”

Ferguson alleged that she entered the bedroom‚ closed the door and began to change when the man entered and overpowered her.

She claimed: “He overpowered me and painfully raped me.”

“It must have been over in about 20 seconds although it felt like a lifetime. He left immediately without saying a word.”

Those memories‚ she said‚ had led to a sense of alienation of her own sexuality‚ something she attributed to delayed post-traumatic stress.

“It’s like a tumour‚ imbalance of the mind‚ something you have hidden but it doesn’t go away.”

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