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‘I survived a kidnapping but part of me died that day’

After a surge in the number of abductions in recent years, South Africa has one of the highest rates of kidnapping in the world, as Mpho Lakaje reports from Johannesburg.

Lesego Tau did not panic at first when a stranger opened the back door of her grey Mercedes C-Class and climbed in.

She had parked outside a shopping mall in Johannesburg and was focused on texting a friend before going in to grab a few items for a get-together that evening.

“In my rear view mirror, I was looking and still thinking: ‘This person is going to be so embarrassed when they realise they are in the wrong car’,” she told the BBC, recounting the events of last June.

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But this was not an innocent mistake.

“Our gazes locked and I realised what was happening.”

This was a kidnapping.

Six months earlier, businessman Yasin Bhiku was grabbed in the driveway of his home, near Johannesburg, just after returning from the mosque.

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CCTV footage that was widely seen on social media shows Mr Bhiku dressed in a blue T-shirt and black trousers calmly chatting to a friend.

Two men can be seen getting out of the car parked opposite. At first they stroll towards him, but then rush at him after Mr Bhiku realises what is going on and tries to flee.

'I survived a kidnapping but part of me died that day'
Images and footage of the abduction of Yasin Bhiku were shared on social media

He was overpowered and forced into the vehicle at gunpoint. The businessman was later found unharmed and rescued by the police.

Ms Tau, who runs her own cleaning company in Pretoria, also tried to flee once she had figured out that she was about to be abducted.

She said she tried opening the door of her car, but another man, dressed as a parking attendant in a hi-vis jacket, blocked the door.

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The man in the back seat showed that he had a gun and ordered Ms Tau to drive out of the shopping complex.

Along the way, she was told to stop and someone else jumped into her car.

Four-hour ordeal

Once in the countryside, about 15km (nine miles) into the terrifying journey, the kidnappers ordered Ms Tau to stop.

A red car then arrived at the scene and someone got out, took her bank cards and forced her to reveal her security codes.

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“The other people from the car… started going through all my different cards. They were withdrawing [money].”

At the same time, her captors were repeatedly hitting her on the head with the gun, ordering her to increase her withdrawal limit.

The ordeal went on for over four hours.

At one point she heard someone on the other end of a phone call say: “Just finish her off. We are done.”

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“I made peace that they were going to kill me, but I thought, I need to fight. I have to fight. If they are going to kill me, I might as well fight,” Ms Tau said.

She fought her way out of the car, but the kidnappers grabbed her and started hitting and scratching her. She got away and ran across the road into the oncoming traffic.

This story and that of Mr Bhiku are not isolated.

In February, Police Minister Bheki Cele revealed that 2,605 kidnapping cases had been reported to the authorities in the last three months of 2021.

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In the decade from 2010, kidnapping more than doubled in South Africa and there are now 10 kidnappings per 100,000 people, according to the South African think-tank the Institute for Security Studies. This is one of the highest rates in the world.

In 2018, Mr Cele promised to make dealing with kidnapping a priority.

Victims have been kept against their will either for a ransom, to have their bank accounts cleaned out or be sexually assaulted.

Some did not make it out alive, though it is not clear how frequent this outcome is.

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In an attempt to deal with these kind of crimes, the police launched a kidnapping task team, combining intelligence gathering with tactical response.

Crime syndicates target South Africa

One thing that has been established is that kidnappers tend to work in teams and the abductions follow a pattern with each gang member having a set role, police spokesperson Col Athlenda Mathe told the BBC.

“The spotters are those that would follow the target. The pickers are those who move in to kidnap the victim.”

The kidnappers often drive high-performance vehicles and are usually heavily armed.

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“Then we have the guards that would take over and keep the victim… until a ransom is paid.”

But in the background, there is a mastermind who does thorough research and pulls the strings.

“The kingpin would be someone who lives a high-end life and wouldn’t do the dirty job,” Col Mathe says.

'I survived a kidnapping but part of me died that day'
Police Minister Bheki Cele (C) has said that tackling kidnapping is a priority

These criminal syndicates have tentacles in countries like neighbouring Mozambique and as far afield as Pakistan.

They tend to mostly target wealthy business people with the means to pay a ransom, but some victims have been from low-income areas and children are not spared.

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Private hostage negotiator Gérard Labuschagne says there has been an increase in very high-value cases. Ransoms can be set at up to $3m (£2.3m)

“Organised groups operating in Mozambique and other parts of Africa have now decided, for whatever reason, that South Africa is ripe for this type of crime and they’ve been committing it very successfully,” Mr Labuschagne says.

Some social commentators believe general lawlessness has made South Africa attractive to organised criminals from around the world.

In the face of public anger, the police acknowledge that more work needs to be done but Col Mathe says they have made progress.

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“Since the identification of these syndicates, we have arrested 115 suspects, consisting of Pakistanis, Mozambicans as well as South Africans.”

One of the suspects is 43-year-old Faizel Charloos, who was taken into custody in March.

He is believed to be the mastermind behind a spate of recent kidnappings.

During police raids in several Johannesburg properties linked to him, drugs, cash and a high-powered vehicle were recovered.

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Mr Charloos recently appeared in court, along with several others, on kidnapping charges. He has made no comment.

It emerged that he has dual citizenship in South Africa and Mozambique.

‘Police don’t rescue victims’

In a separate case in April, police successfully rescued a four-year-old girl who was snatched at a school in Johannesburg, by a woman pretending to be her childminder.

Her kidnappers had earlier demanded thousands of dollars for her safe return.

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But four people were arrested when they arrived outside a shopping centre to collect the ransom.

Despite such breakthroughs, Mr Labuschagne is not convinced the police are winning.

“We have had one or two arrests. But in the overwhelming majority of these cases, the police don’t rescue the kidnapped victims from where they’ve been kept. They are released after a payment.”

Ms Tau was lucky that she managed to get away, but her kidnappers took $1,400 (£1,100).

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The ordeal has damaged her psychologically and left her family distressed.

“My father is not a man who cries, but he got teary. He kept on feeling like he could have protected me.

“There’s still a part of me that actually died on that day.”

Source: bbc

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Attempts to kill natural therapy?

Sikaman Palava

Anyone who has the devil’s bene­diction of getting sick of diabetes and jaundice at the same time would surely blame an experienced witch for his or her palaver. Fact is, the combination is a dreaded one with the form and visage of an obituary.

The bio-chemical analysis of the unholy combination is, however, within arm’s reach. Diabetes doesn’t tolerate sugar and jaundice can’t get cured with­out glucose (sugar). The two diseases are therefore irreconcilable under any medical condition. They are just not of the same womb!

So the terrified patient has to choose between two styles of dying: either curing the diabetes or dying of jaundice or curing the jaundice and falling into a diabetic coma en route to a cold room transit. The next available plane is destined for the cemetery, meaning the world no longer has any business to do with you.

Now, forgetting about pathological combinations and narrowing the focus on diabetes, one can still crumble in fear. The reason is that diabetes as a disease is not a benevolent ailment. We can understand this because it has nev­er been philanthropic in any sense of the word. It demands its pound of flesh, and that is often worth a human life.

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The problem is that, if you have too much sugar in your blood (hyperglyce­mia), you risk falling into coma. If your sugar level is also too low, a terrible coma awaits you. You just can’t un­derstand the malevolence associated with the disease so you have to keep a balance.

TREACHERY

I am writing this piece because of the sundry sinister attempts of treach­ery, overt and covert, being subtly perpetrated to kill Natural Therapy which claims a cure for diabetes. The claim is completely at variance with the assertion of orthodox practitioners who believe that diabetes can only be man­aged, but can never be cured.

Basically, diabetes occurs when the pancreas is not producing enough insulin to cope with blood sugar, or is not producing insulin at all. The result is a debilitating disease with several compli­cations that can lead to death.

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To combat the disease, one has to be put on diaonil or daily insulin injections supposedly to manage the disease, not to cure it because according to medical gurus, it cannot be cured.

Natural therapists have a different and more progresso-radical view. They say diabetes can be cured and they are proving it every day of the week. Happi­ly, medical doctors who develop diabe­tes are now coming for natural therapy, albeit under the cover of darkness. Today, there are many living testimonies of a natural therapy cure for the deadly ailment.

I was really sad about a silly attempt to frustrate the efforts of a well-known Texas-trained naturopathic physician who has toned down the orthodox medi­cal chorus that diabetes is not cur-able. Many of his patients who had been on insulin for years before seeing him are off it.

The medical crusade is a veritable one, and the good news is being propa­gated by those who have seen the light. Dr Kwesi Ofei-Agyemang’s success story is one that needs to be told from the roof-tops. But ask me, how is he being frustrated?

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On October 28, 1996, a diabetic patient of Dr Ofei-Agyemang had her sugar level checked. It was 6.1 mmo1/1. After treatment using naturopathic methods, she became well and was asked to check her sugar level again at a laboratory (name withheld) on 6-11- 96. Surprisingly, the lab recorded 13.3 mmol/l; meaning that her situation had worsened by far.

When she brought the report, Dr Ofei-Agyemang was sceptical about it. The patient was supposed to have recovered, or at least was recovering. The level could, therefore, not be 13.3. He rushed to the laboratory to demand an explanation.

When Dr Ofei-Agymang queried the report, the technician said he was sorry and added that he’d investigate the error.

Meanwhile at another laboratory where he sent the patient for another test to cross-check the earlier result, the patient’s sugar level recorded a low 2.9 mmo1/1, a correct reflection of her improved state of health.

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The doctor was furious for a very good reason. If he had taken the earlier lab report seriously and continued treat­ment to further reduce the patient’s sugar level, the patient would have sunk into coma and possibly died.

“This is not the first time this is happening,” Dr Ofei-Agyemang told me in an interview last week Friday. When I send my patients for tests, some lab technicians deliberately don’t return the correct results just because they know the patient is attending a natural therapy clinic.

“I see it as a subtle attempt to kill naturopathy in this country aside other hidden strategies that are being adopted to sabotage it. They are all out to create a wrong impression in the minds of pa­tients that they are going to the wrong place for treatment when in fact they are at the right place.”

Other attempts include doctors warning their patients never to submit themselves to natural therapy whenever the patients suggest they want to try it, knowing well that orthodox medicine isn’t helping them.

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Look at something else like this one. After Dr Ofei-Agyemang had cured one patient of a disease and placed him on a diet of fruits and vegetables, the patient’s brother (a doctor) advised him to quit the natural diet regimen and to eat plenty of meat and all that has to do with balanced diet.

So the patient quit the natural diet and ate meat to his fill. Before long boils broke out all over his body. Apparently, the body was rejecting the unnatural diet which had become toxic to the body following the spell of natural dieting.

FAILURE

I have been thinking about this diabetic cure controversy for some time now. I was compelled to ask the natural therapist to explain how naturopathy could possibly tread where orthodox medicine has woefully failed as far as a cure to diabetes was concerned.

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He explained that a defective pan­creas only needs to be revived through selective manipulation, diet and urine therapy to make it function again. If de­fects in other organs of the body can be corrected, there should be no medical reason why the pancreas should be an exception, he said.

“What other doctors must know is that once our methods are different, our results will naturally be different,” he said. “What they are supposed to be saying in fact is that ‘according to orthodox medicine, there is no cure for diabetes.’ They should stop saying there is no cure for diabetes because we are curing it. If they doubt it they should come here and see things for them­selves.

“Our methods are natural and include colon irrigation, deep tissue massage which is more effective than physiotherapy, diet, some fast and manipulation, and urine therapy. There is no way any disease can survive a combination of these methods.

Cancerous sores and all kinds of chronic ailments have been cured, dia­betes inclusive.

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“We just rejuvenate the dormant pancreas and it starts producing insulin. Unless the pancreas is cut out through surgery as a result of cancer, we have ways of making it work.”

I spoke to one of his patients, Jamison Ocansey. He was sick of diabe­tes and has been on herbs of all kinds, insulin and dioanil for more than a year. His sugar level fluctuated between 9 to 17 mmo1/c. After treatment, his sugar level is between 5.0 and 5.9 mmol/c.

“People don’t like this method because of the urine that is included in the method of cure,” he said.”I used to feel the same way but as I’m now cured, I’ve an entirely different opinion. Let me also thank your paper Weekly Spectator. It was an article in it that made me come here, so keep spreading the message.

“I used to be very weak and couldn’t walk. Look, now I am as strong as a bull. I eat well and I’m happy.”

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The doctor has cured various types of diseases at his clinic which is 100 metres north of Holy Gardens or Lido, Circle, Accra. What I believe would help us all is that the medical authorities should investigate these cures and come out openly to claim or disclaim them.

Those who are off insulin would also give testimony. That way, natural therapy can become more acceptable and there would be no point in anybody trying to frustrate efforts at entrench­ing it as the better substitute that has no side effects. It should in fact be the ideal complement to orthodox medicine and not an adversary as people want to portray it.

This article was first publish on Satur­day, November 16, 1996

Merari Alomele’s

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The problem is that, if you have too much sugar in your blood (hyperglycemia), you risk falling into coma. If your sugar level is also too low, a terrible coma awaits you. You just can’t un­derstand the malevolence associated with the disease so you have to keep a balance.

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 It is great to be young

 If I had the power, I believe I may be tempted to remain a child forever. We used to hear statements it is great to be young when growing up.

I did not really comprehend one anybody would wish to be like me, a small boy and not wish to be an adult like my Dad. Those were the days that the family did not sit around a dining table and your Dad’s meal was set up on a small table at a particular spot in the hall.

When I observed the amount of meat that were given to my Dad and what was given to me, l definitely wanted to grow up quickly to also become an adult. Therefore to hear some adults occasionally declare that it is great to be young, was some­thing I could not understand.

My reasoning was that, adults were enjoying a lot of benefits and so for any adult to even consider the possi­bility

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When I grew up however, I have come to appreciate that saying that indeed, it is great to be young. Growing up as a child, all l looked up to was the next day to come as I go to bed. When I woke up, l had no worries about what I would eat before going to school.

Where the next meal was going to come from was not my concern. All l had to do was to make sure that I go to school, study hard and pass my ex­ams and ensure that I am within the first three, in my class. There was no worrying about school fees, chang­ing of school uniforms or clothes in general, something I cannot run from now as an adult.

I now have to provide for some people now and I can now fully un­derstand my Dad’s comment that it is great to be young.

Christmas time was a very inter­esting and exciting time as a child because new clothes were provided for me and my siblings. I recall one Christmas period when I was provid­ed with a suit. It was a memorable occasion in my life as it was the first time I wore a suit.

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I felt very proud wearing the suit and with my new shoes to match, I felt great walking with my friends as we moved from place to place. When a new academic term begins I always looked forward to having a new school uniform. How much it was going to cost or how it was going to be provided was not my concern at all. It was taken for granted that I will get a new uniform at all cost.

I always had a good night’s sleep with the exception of those days that I was suffering from malaria and I had quite a number of such malaria attacks.

Recently my last born jokingly said “Daddy, do not think that I am not going to take money from you when I grow up oh. Even when I get mar­ried and have children, do not think you will be free. I will still collect money from you because you are my father”.

I burst into laughter and said “It is great to be young”. At the moment, her needs are provided by me and until she completes school and starts working, I will continue to provide for her needs. There have been mo­ments that I wish I were a child once again.

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I recall an incident involving my little girlie as I affectionately call my last born, when she pushed a piece of chalk into her nostril and we had to take her to the hospital, and wondering how it was going to come out. While her mother and I were worried at the hospital, she did not seem bothered and in that moment I wished I was a child. When the nurses finally got it out, I was so relieved and she was just smiling, obviously not worried as I was. Indeed, it is great to be young.

NB: ‘CHANGE KOTOKA INTERNA­TIONAL AIRPORT TO KOFI BAAKO INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT’

By Laud Kissi-Mensah

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