Filha de Samora Machel espancada pelo namorado até perder a visão

Graça’s daughter speaks out after brutal assault

2015-11-15 16:01

Mondli Makhanya

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Josina Machel. Picture: Elizabeth Sejake

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Graça Machel’s daughter was so badly beaten by her boyfriend that she has permanently lost sight in one eye.

Josina Machel, who was constantly at her mother’s side during the mourning and funeral preparations for her stepfather Nelson Mandela, was this week given the devastating news that her right eye would never work again.

Since the assault, which took place in Mozambique on October 17 – her mother’s 70th birthday – she has been undergoing treatment and hoping against hope that specialists will be able to restore her vision.

Her boyfriend and alleged attacker is a well-known and politically connected businessman from Maputo with interests in South Africa. He is due to appear in court soon in connection with the attack and cannot be named until he does.

Josina told her horrifying story to City Press a week before the start of the 16 Days of Activism for No Violence Against Women and Children campaign. She says by speaking out about her experience and working with organisations already active in the field, she hopes to “be a reference and inspiration to women to be able to come out, to tell their stories, to take their stories to court”.

Her horror started after she spent October 16 with her mother at a pre-birthday celebration, during which they packed food for poor children.

Later, Graça Machel returned to South Africa to attend to other commitments. And after representing her family at a theatrical performance based on the lives of her parents Graça and Samora, Josina left “to spend some time with my significant other”.

At the end of the evening, she asked him to take her to her family home because she wanted to sleep in her mother’s bed and “experience” her as she turned 70.

“I wanted to be with my mother; I wanted to experience my mother. I was missing her. We were going to celebrate her birthday the following day and so I just wanted to feel my mum around me. That is why I was so adamant about going home,” she said.

Then her “intimate partner” refused and began throwing accusations at her and insulting her.

“There were just insults, just bad words. He expressed his unhappiness about me wanting to go home. I have blocked them out of my mind somehow emotionally. They are just not words that I expected to hear from anyone. They were demeaning of any woman and of me,” she said.

While the insults were flying, she felt a punch in the face.

“I was so shocked that I did what everybody does when something happens to you. You don’t turn towards your aggressor. You protect yourself and you try to protect your face, but to my surprise, I actually turned towards him and I asked ‘WHAT?!’

“That is how I got the second jab that blinded me, which ruptured the eye almost immediately. I felt the third one coming and that’s when I ran out of the car, ran away from him.”

Josina ran down the road in the affluent suburb, which houses diplomats and prominent people, screaming for help in Portuguese and English.

“My eye was leaking so much that I was asking for help while covering the other eye because I thought [it] was actually falling out,” she said.

Her hope for help from residents or guards in the highly secured neighbourhood was dashed when “no one helped me”.

“It was a horrifying experience. It was one of the loneliest and scariest experiences that one can go through,” she says of the moments following the beating.

She believes she tripped on something and blacked out because the next thing she remembers is waking up in hospital.

After some tests, the doctors diagnosed an “eruption and displacement of the retina, which meant I could not see light ... and therefore lost the ability to see.

“By the time my brother called to say happy birthday to my mum, he had bad news to give,” said Josina.

After four weeks of tests and treatment, doctors delivered the devastating news to her this week.

“I’m still going through myriad feelings. To be honest, I have not been able to grieve, I have not been able to cry, I have not been angry, I have not been able to feel all those emotions that happened because I’ve been concentrating on my eye and that delayed the pain,” she said.

“If I start crying, I say to myself: ‘Josina, don’t cry because this might affect your eye. Don’t put pressure on your eye.’

“At this point, all I know is that this has changed my life. It has gutted my mother. She is at the sunset of her life. She turned 70 on that day and this is the present that she got.

“So she is gutted; my family, my brothers are hurting beyond belief; my children have not been able to voice what is happening.”

Josina now wants to use her story “for every single woman who has gone through this experience and, unfortunately, for the women that will still be going through this experience”.

She says as a gender activist, she had always worked towards ending violence against women “but in my wildest dreams I never imagined it would happen to me”.

The experience has spurred her to dedicate her life to ensuring that “no violence is perpetuated against women and no violence is perpetuated against men”.

“I also felt that not standing up in this fight will be an indictment on the legacy of my parents. Papa Madiba has always defended women’s rights and my mum is the epitome of the significance of fights against injustice against women. So at this point, I have no right to be quiet and not to stand up.”

Read more on:    graca machel

AGREDIDA ATÉ PERDER A VISÃO: Activista dá testemunho sobre violência doméstica

 

(In jornal NOTÍCIAS, 16/11/2015)

Os crimes de violência doméstica devem ser publicitados e não podem ficar impunes, de modo a desencorajar a sua prática e estimular as vítimas, sobretudo as mulheres, a denunciarem quem os comete.

A tese é defendida por Josina Machel ou simplesmente Jo Machel, activista contra a violência doméstica, que acredita que a exposição dos casos que acontecem pode ajudar a sociedade a compreender a dimensão e gravidade do problema, levando a uma acção conjunta contra a sua prática.

Jo Machel foi vítima, ela própria, de um crime de violência doméstica protagonizado pelo seu companheiro, do que resultou na perda de visão devido a uma lesão grave contraída no olho direito.

“Decidi contar a minha história porque sou activista contra a violência doméstica e, infelizmente, isso aconteceu comigo. É por achar que este tipo de crime não pode ficar impune, decidi partilhar a minha experiência com todos, porque acredito que isso pode ajudar a mostrar a dimensão do problema”, disse Jo Machel, que é filha da Graça Machel, presidente da Fundação para o Desenvolvimento da Comunidade (FDC).

A agressão física aconteceu na cidade de Maputo mas a conversa com o “Notícias” teve lugar na sua residência em Joanesburgo, África do Sul, onde reside actualmente e para onde foi evacuada após a agressão, a fim de receber tratamentos médicos.

Segundo conta, tudo aconteceu na madrugada de 17 de Outubro, quando a vítima regressava de um espectáculo na companhia do seu namorado e amigos.

“Pouco depois de deixarmos um nosso amigo num dos hotéis da cidade, expliquei ao meu companheiro que gostaria de ir dormir em casa da minha mãe. Naquele dia a minha mãe completava 70 anos e, como filha, nada melhor que estar ao lado dela. Além disso, o período de 17 a 19 de Outubro de cada ano sempre remexe com a nossa família, pois primeiro celebramos o aniversário da mamã e depois temos a data do assassinato do meu pai. Acho que o meu companheiro não entendeu esta minha pretensão e de forma inexplicável começou a violentar-me alegando que eu queria livrar-me dele e voltar para me encontrar com os meus amigos e continuar a celebrar a noite, insinuações sem fundamentos. Surpreende-me com socos na cara, que infelizmente me atingiram no olho direito. Tudo isso passou-se dentro do carro”, conta a entrevistada.

“Naquele instante da agressão tudo ficou escuro. Surpresa com a atitude dele e na tentativa de me explicar, ele não parava de me agredir até que decidi abrir a porta e fugir em busca de socorro. Nessa altura já estava a sangrar muito. Cheguei a pensar que o olho havia saído. Para meu espanto, ninguém saiu para me socorrer, embora tenha sido numa zona nobre da cidade. Quando ensaiava a fuga tropecei e cai, tendo perdido os sentidos. Levaram-me ao hospital e estava com receio de perder o olho, dada a gravidade dos ferimentos e por ter perdido muito sangue. Infelizmente, as minhas suspeitas confirmaram-se. Como o olho estava aberto fui operada naquela madrugada em Maputo e tive 13 pontos. Com a intervenção da minha família, fui evacuada para uma clinica na África do Sul onde fui operada há 15 anos. Constataram que houve erupção da retina e, é isto que criou-me esta cegueira do olho direito”, lamentou a jovem.

Pelo que aconteceu, Josina Machel diz ter sido instaurado um processo-crime contra o seu ex-companheiro que, segundo ela, deverá responder em juízo.

“Trata-se de um caso de violência doméstica. Como família tínhamos a possibilidade de abafar o assunto e deixar passar como se nada tivesse acontecido mas preferimos denunciar publicamente para mostrar à sociedade. Sendo eu activista contra a violência doméstica, seria irónico não denunciar. Isto pode acontecer a qualquer mulher, independentemente do seu estatuto social, grau de instrução ou estado civil. Não concordo com violência doméstica. Seja de homem para mulher ou vice-versa”, disse.

Garantiu que vai se empenhar no sentido de elevar a voz das mulheres vítimas de violência, juntando ao esforço que o país tem vindo a realizar.

“Temos que reforçar a nossa lei e formar muito mais gente no sector de Saúde e da Polícia para melhor atenderem casos de género, sobretudo nas primeiras horas de agressão. Vou-me empenhar na criação de casas de refúgio para mulheres vítimas de violência por forma a passar uma temporada antes de voltar aos seus lares, pois é complicado para uma mulher agredida de imediato voltar à casa”, disse Josina Machel.