Community members have rallied around a little boy who was brutally raped, with counselling services, physiotherapy and psychology sessions set up for him.
“It has been a good day today,” the child’s 22-year-old sister said.
The boy and his sister were speaking after a report on their ordeal, in which they were allegedly sent away from two police stations in the space of three days when they went to report the rape, was published in The Herald on Thursday.
The alleged rapist lives near their Kwazakhele home.
The siblings had gone to the Kwazakhele police station on Saturday and the New Brighton police station on Tuesday to try to open a case.
The boy, 9, was savagely raped twice last week, allegedly by the same man who had also raped him in 2017.
On Thursday, residents and Dora Nginza staff members helped the badly traumatised little boy, who has been struggling to walk after the assault, to access the mental and physical health facilities at the hospital that will help get him on the path to recovery.
“[On Thursday] morning, we went to Dora Nginza’s Thuthuzela centre for my brother’s counselling session, and two cops came to take official statements regarding us being turned away by the two police stations,” the sister said.
“We were also told that we had an appointment with Dr Megan Schultz from the mental health unit at Dora Nginza who would personally assess my brother and make further recommendations.”
She said the doctor had been very helpful and had set up another appointment with her brother for Monday.
“The doctor wanted to do further assessment to see what would be best for him.”
Dr Schultz said she had heard of cases where victims lost the sense of their limbs as a result of psychological trauma and regained feeling after a few sessions of therapy.
She said the boy would receive intensive therapy.
Police spokesperson Andre Beetge said the police would investigate the siblings’ claims.
The siblings will be going to court today to apply for a protection order against the alleged rapist.