‘The survivor deserves her right to privacy’ — Kabelo Mabalane ‘reached out’ to abuse victim without success

Kwaito star Kabelo Mabalane reportedly reached out to his abuse victim to make amends but was unsuccessful.

The star was at the centre of a social media storm this week for his participation in a 16 Days of Activism campaign, #NoExcuse, encouraging men who abuse their partners to take responsibility for their actions and seek help.

In a post promoting the initative, Kabelo spoke about being an abuser.

“As a young man, I too, was a perpetrator of this shameful, cowardly behaviour. The shame and the embarrassment made me shy away from these spaces and I’ve since learned that as important as it is to take full responsibility for this reprehensible, unacceptable behaviour, I am also now at a place where I appreciate the importance of lending my voice to fighting this pandemic,” he wrote on Instagram.

Speaking to Sowetan on Thursday amid the outcry over his involvement in the campaign, Kabelo said he had reached out to his victim without success.

“Yes I have. Unsuccessfully so. I’m not at liberty to speak on the matter as the survivor deserves her right to privacy.”

He said he was participating in the campaign because of the scourge of gender-based violence.

Attempts to get comment from Kabelo were unsuccessful at the time of publishing this article. It will be updated once received.

Speaking to TshisaLIVE, the founder of #NoExcuse Khomotso Komape said they had no plans to cut Kabelo from the campaign.

“Let's take Kabelo as a human being because all of us, we have mistakes. We are happy as an organisation that one of our own came out and spoke. There are a lot of men who don't want to say anything, but they have a lot of mistakes in their lives.

“We must treat someone who came out and spoke about what's going on in their lives as if they are the only one in the world who made that mistake. We must treat Kabelo like others, and the more we are bullying him we are condemning him. We must make sure we stop bullying him. He came out to say what he said to us and we must stop bullying Kabelo.”