Limpopo courts give two rapists life sentences

Women, teenagers and a child raped by two men are finally able to seek closure after lengthy jail terms were handed down by the Limpopo courts.

In addition to four life sentences handed down by the high court in Polokwane, Bless Doctor Nakana, 23, from Ga-Mokgoathi village in Bolobedu outside Tzaneen, was given a further 20 years for two counts of rape.

Police spokesperson Col Moatshe Ngoepe said Nakana had pounced on pupils on their way home from school, on mothers with their daughters in the veld collecting firewood and in some instances broke into the homes of women who lived alone.

The victims included a 58-year-old woman and her daughter, both of whom he took turns raping together with his 43-year-old uncle, who has since died.

His other victims included a 13-year-old girl, who had been walking from school with a friend, and a 16-year-old girl who had been sleeping alone in her house. 

In 2015, the "twisted man" broke into a house where he threatened a 14-year-old girl and raped her grandmother. In the same year, he attacked and repeatedly raped a 16-year-old girl and raped a 23-year-old woman in the presence of her child.

The Mankweng Regional Court outside Polokwane handed down a life sentence to a 36-year-old man from the Ga-Mothapo area, after finding him guilty of raping his six-year-old neighbour.

Police did not name the man but said that in September 2015, "the victim was playing with her friends when the suspect lured her to his room, stripped her naked and raped her".

The provincial commissioner of police in Limpopo, Lt-Gen Nneke Jim Ledwaba, on Friday welcomed the life sentences given to the  two rapists. He said Limpopo police were dedicated to playing their part in ensuring that offenders in cases affecting women and children were jailed.