A woman’s right to withhold consent to sexual intercourse is one violated far too often in this country, a Port Elizabeth judge said on Friday before handing down a life sentence to the man convicted of the brutal rape of a student.
The man, who was convicted earlier in November of the rape of a Nelson Mandela University student, was sentenced to life imprisonment and an additional 35 years by the Port Elizabeth High Court on Friday.
Handing down sentence, acting judge Lee-Anne AhShene said although she took into consideration Mziyanda Yoyo's personal circumstances prior to the October 1 2016 attack, she had to take into account the impact the attack had on the 25-year-old victim.
"[The attack] was a brutal invasion of her privacy. A woman’s right to withhold consent to sexual intercourse is one of the rights violated far too often in this country," Ah-Shene said.
Last week, Yoyo, 32, was convicted on charges of rape, attempted murder, assault and pointing of anything which is likely to lead a person to believe it is a firearm. He was acquitted on the charge of kidnapping.
Yoyo's co-accused, Mziyanda Kana, 31, was acquitted on all charges after Ah-Shene found the state had not proved his guilt beyond reasonable doubt.
In her judgment, Ah-Shene said Yoyo had not been a credible witness, became argumentative during cross-examination and his version of events did not add up.
Both men were acquitted on the kidnapping charge after AhShene found that the woman, who is not being named as she is a victim of a sex crime, had willingly accompanied Kana and Yoyo to a house in Walmer township, where she allegedly had consensual sex with Kana.
Yoyo threatened the woman with a gun and assaulted her before the woman, Yoyo, Kana and another person only identified as Raymond, got into a car and drove to Victoria Drive, where they pulled off on a gravel road.
Kana testified that he stayed in the car while the woman was lead to nearby bushes. There she was further assaulted and raped before one of the men threatened to shoot her, but the gun jammed. The woman was then beaten with a metal pole and left for dead.
She later made her way to Victoria Drive.
Conflicting statements by the victim led Ah-Shene to question the validity of her claim that Kana had raped her.