Brave survivor reveals trauma: 'My mom chose a husband over me' after stepfather's sentencing

The brave 24-year-old woman, whose stepfather was sentenced to life imprisonment plus an additional forty years for sexually abusing her over two decades, has described in harrowing detail how his actions have profoundly impacted her life.

On Monday, the Cape Argus published a shocking court case at the Mitchells Plain Regional Court where a 43-year-old man was sentenced to life behind bars for the rape, indecent assault and sexual assault of his step-daughter since the age of seven.

Damning evidence sealed the man’s fate including the harrowing testimony of the woman despite his claims that they were in a “consensual sexual relationship” since she was 19-year-old and even convinced his family and mother of it.

The victim said she has been scarred for life and suffered from trauma and anxiety, in her victim impact statement which was shared with the media by the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA).

She explained that her own mother had betrayed her by siding with the perpetrator.

"I don’t remember how life was before my trauma but the aftereffects of what he did to me till this day still affects my life...  I was diagnosed with anxiety to a point where it affected me at work. It was so bad that I would jump from job to job, the moment I feel unsafe and uneasy in a place, I distance myself or leave. My life has become hard based on my trauma.

“By speaking my truth, my mom chose a husband over me. She literally abandoned me even though she knew what he did to me. She still abandoned me. She first tried to manipulate me to keep me quiet, she honestly didn’t care what I went through at all.”

The man became the woman’s stepfather when she was just three-years-old and the sexual violation began when she was just seven-years-old and it continued for almost two decades.

Eric Ntabazalila, communications for the NPA described in horror the victim’s ordeal: “The accused denied the rapes and claimed that he had an affair with the victim from the age of 19-years-old and had consensual sexual relations with her in the same house she was raised in. 

“State prosecutor, Chantal Adams, led the victim, who testified that her mother would be in the other room when he would pester her for sex and would take her to the bathroom where he would rape her.

“A probation officer’s report indicated that the accused seemed to have convinced his wife and the rest of the family that he had sexual relations with his stepdaughter, who called him daddy.”

He has been declared unfit to possess a firearm and ordered his name to be placed in the National Register for Sex Offenders.

Get your news on the go, click here to join the Cape Argus News WhatsApp channel.

Cape Argus