By Doreen Mokgolo
Over 50 members of the Congress of South African Students attacked 80-year-old Khotso Simelani, father of late Banyana Banyana star Eudy Simelane, in Kwa-Thema, Ekurhuleni, on Wednesday.
The attack happened when Khotso tried to stop the students from assaulting his neighbours and himself when they told them not to steal peaches from a tree.
The students had been marching through the streets since Monday, chanting and singing, ahead of a funeral that is taking place on Saturday.
Simelani was talking to his neighbours, Simphiwe Mngomezulu and Thamsanqa Nage, when the students started climbing a fence to steal peaches from a neighbouring garden.
When the three men tried to stop them, the students insulted and attacked them. All three were badly hurt and had to go to the local clinic.
Simelani said: “I thought they would listen to me because I am an adult, but that didn’t stop them. They continued to assault me.
“I feared for my life. Iām frail and partially deaf. I struggled to hear some of the things they were saying, but I could see the anger in their faces. They also wanted to take my eyesight away.”
Simelani was upset that the students wouldn’t listen to him.
“They were stealing peaches that are not yet ripe. They didn’t want to be reprimanded. What kind of homes do they come from?
“I want all of them to apologise. Thereafter, a fitting punishment will be determined. This is a painful reminder of how my daughter was senselessly killed, and now they want to kill me, too,” he said.
Kwa-Thema police spokesman Constable Nkululeko Magudulela encouraged the three men to visit the police station so that the officers could help them open a case.
Eudy Simelane, a talented midfielder, was open about being a lesbian, and on 28 April 2008, her body was found in a ditch on the outskirts of KwaThema, after she had been raped, robbed and stabbed more than 25 times.
Two of her four attackers were arrested and convicted of her murder.
Pictured above: Khotso Simelani.
Source: Doreen Mokgolo
