Four years later, man tells
of brutal beating by police
“I rushed over to the station where I found Malibe
with blood running down his face as he had an open wound to his head.
Johanri Coetzee | 29 September 2014 16:10
LYDENBURG – Four years after Mr Oupa Malibe was assaulted by six police
offers, Malibe shared his version of what happened on April 29, 2009 in the
holding cells of the local police station.
“On the 29th one of the police officers entered the cells I was kept in,
demanding me to hand over a phone they alleged I had in my possession. I told
him I had nothing on me. They took me out of the cell and started assaulting me
as a group. They hit me with a plank, kicked me and beat me numerous times. The
assault continued for about an hour. I begged them to take me to the hospital,
but they used abusive language and threw me into another cell. I couldn’t see
and I was bleeding. They never found the phone,” Malibe said.
An anonymous community member told the paper that they received a phone
call from the station to visit the victim. “I rushed over to the station where
I found Malibe with blood running down his face as he had an open wound to his
head. He was crying and he couldn’t even stand on his feet. We told the police
that we would bring our own private doctor if they did not send him to
hospital,” the community member said.
According to the member they went back to the station in the afternoon
to find that Malibe ha been taken to the hospital. They found him tied to his
bed and under police guard.
“I spent almost a month in hospital and still suffer from a lot of pain,
especially in my spinal cord”, Malibe told the paper. “I don’t feel free and
although I have forgiven them, I still think they must be jailed”.
