Trial of 81 suspects arrested in Krugersdorp rescheduled for next Wednesday

The case against 81 suspects who were arrested in Krugersdorp over the weekend has been postponed to Wednesday next week at the Krugersdorp Magistrate’s Court.

The suspects were arrested following the gang rape of eight women who were part of a production crew shooting a music video. They were working on site when the attack took place on Thursday, near a mine dump in Krugersdorp, west of Johannesburg.

At this stage, none of the suspects have yet been linked to the rapes.

All the suspects made brief appearances in the dock on Wednesday, before their cases were postponed to next week Wednesday. This is to allow the state time to conduct identity parades and DNA tests on the suspects.

Most of the suspects have also not yet secured legal representation.

‘SA under siege’

Members of political organisations, who gathered outside the court, have called on law enforcement agencies to uphold the rule of law and arrest illegal foreign nationals.

Action SA councillor, Meshack van Wyk says South Africans are under siege by undocumented immigrants.

“We are under siege in our own country and if the police do not strengthen the laws in South Africa, we will go down to the dungeons because there is no law in this country and as Action SA, we say to strengthen the laws and implement the laws and only when the laws are implemented, there will be order. We propose that law and order be brought back to South Africa otherwise we will find that people that come from other countries keep us at bay in our own country. We are saying no to gender-based violence,” says van Wyk.

The African National Congress’s Nomvula Mokonyane says the government is planning on expropriating the land where illegal miners operate to ensure safer communities.

“The absent mine owners have left these workers, the illegal immigrants without taking them back to the countries of their origin. It’s the exploitation that has been going on here, we are here to say we can’t live under a reign of terror and we are calling on everybody to support the government’s intention to expropriate all those pockets of land whether it’s Simunye, Lonmin, whoever it is who deserted. Even now we believe there are many who are underground and we have all been living in misery in this area,” says Mokonyane.

VIDEO: Krugersdorp – Concerns and possible solutions put forward to combat illegal mining, violence:

On Tuesday, law enforcement agencies conducted a high-level multi-disciplinary operation, targeting illegal mining operations in the West Rand. More than 40 suspects were arrested.

Police Minister Bheki Cele, who led the operation, says he’s confident that the suspects who gang-raped the eight women will be tracked down and arrested soon.

“We are collecting more people, we are collecting more cellular phones in big numbers and some of them will be taken and downloaded and we will find out who are the real owners. But with this sweeping, we are doing, definitely, the perpetrators will be found but we need to go beyond those that caused that and make sure that we stop even the future crime being committed by these people who are illegal. Quite a big number of them, foreign nationals especially from Mozambique so we will have to work out what happened is something that we stop and never happens again,” says Cele.