S. African Lesbian's Body Found in Trash Bin

The body of a missing lesbian in a Cape Town, South Africa, township was discovered in a trash bin, a Sept. 12 Independent Online article said. Police say that her slaying was carried out by a next-door neighbor, and was motivated by anti-gay bias.

Nontsikelelo Tyatyeka, a resident of Nyanga township, had been missing for a year. During that time, the suspect in the case, a 29-year-old man whose name was not released to the press but who had grown up with Tyatyeka, kept asking the missing 21-year-old woman's mother whether she had been found.

Tyatyeka, described as a "tomboy" in the press, disappeared last September, reported IOL. Her mother, Nombasa Tyatyeka, learned that an acquaintance of the suspect had told her nephew that the missing young woman had been stabbed to death for refusing to sleep with the suspect.

"In August, my nephew was listening to a song written for Ntsiki's return and when this man heard it he told my nephew the suspect tried to sleep with her and when she refused because she's a tomboy, he stabbed her," Nombasa Tyatyeka told the press.

"Just last week he asked me if my daughter has been found yet," the bereaved mother added. "And all the while he knew exactly what happened."

According to the tipster, the suspect had wrapped the body in a makeshift shroud of blankets and hidden it under his bed. Then he stuffed the body into a rubbish bin, where it remained until police found it after being notified of what Nombasa Tyatyeka's nephew had been told.

The body was discovered on Sept. 9. Police issued a statement and said that the 29-year-old suspect had been taken into custody and would face murder charges.

Nyanga residents denounced the killing and destroyed the suspect's home, the article said.

"This is nothing but homophobia," one Nyanga dweller told the local media. "This is not the first time a lesbian woman is hurt in Nyanga," added the resident. "The suspects must be punished."

South Africa is the only nation in the world that guarantees the equal civil right of LGBT citizens in its constitution. But the reality in the streets is much different than the country's vaunted law. Anti-gay violence is prevalent in the townships, and lesbians are at particular risk for rape and murder.

Anti-gay men believing that "corrective" rape can transform lesbians into heterosexual women carry out sexual assaults with alarming frequency. Sometimes the assaults escalate into murder. Such was the case when national soccer star Eudy Simelane was gang raped and murdered in 2008. The three men whop raped Simelane also stabbed her 25 times in an instance of the overkill that characterizes anti-gay violence.

Such attacks might also be the result of the frustrations that South African men feel in a country with high unemployment, an Aug. 26, 2009, article in the Irish newspaper the Independent suggested.

"Men are unemployed and feel traditional male preserves such as football or drinking in a bar are under attack. That was Eudy's crime, "the director for the Lesbian and Gay Equality Project, Phumi Mtetna, told the Independent. "An aggravating factor was that she did not look like a typical female."

Mtetna said that instances of "corrective rape" are probably under-reported. "Most survivors of these attacks do not report them," the article quoted her as saying. "We believe there are hundreds of people who have been targeted."

Such attacks are part of a larger trend, Mtetna asserted. "People are just getting killed here because they are different, like HIV-positive people have been killed in the past." Moreover, Mtetna noted that gay and lesbian victims cannot necessarily rely on the authorities for assistance.

"If a lesbian tries to report a rape, police will say something like, 'Who would rape someone looking like you?' " the article quoted her as saying.

Earlier this year, a lesbian activist was similarly raped and murdered. Noxolo Nogwaza, 24, who lived in the township of Kwa-Thema, was slain sometime between the evening of April 23, when she was seen at a bar in a neighboring township, and the morning of April 24, when her mutilated body was discovered in an alley near the bar.

News site All Africa.com reported that Nogwaza's head had been "disfigured" by being smashed with a rock, and she had suffered stab wounds from broken glass. Moreover, it appeared that she had been raped, perhaps multiple times. Condoms littered the crime scene, along with a rock and a broken beer bottle, the article said.

The Human Rights Watch excoriated the murder and called for the South African government to launch a full investigation right away.

"Nogwaza's death is the latest in a long series of sadistic crimes against lesbians, gay men, and transgender people in South Africa," the HRW's Dipika Nath said in a press release. "The vicious nature of the assault is a potent reminder that these attacks are premeditated, planned, and often committed with impunity."

"Nogwaza was an active member of the Ekurhuleni Pride Organizing Committee (EPOC), which has organized LGBT pride marches for Kwa-Thema and nearby townships in Ekurhuleni district since 2009," the HRW release said.

"Members of EPOC are well known in the community for being lesbian, gay, and transgender, and some have faced harassment and attacks as a result of their visibility," the release continued. "EPOC activists report that physical and sexual attacks often go unreported. There is rampant verbal abuse and threats against people on the grounds of their gender expression and sexual orientation in Kwa-Thema, Duduza, Vosloorus, Tsakane, and other townships in Ekurhuleni."

The press release noted that Nogwaza had gone to a bar in the township of Tsakane. She was at the bar with a female friend when a man began hitting on the friend. Nogwaza and the man exchanged words, and Nogwaza's friend left. Nogwaza was found dead at about 9:00 the next morning. Nobody had called the police during the lethal attack, although residents said that they had heard screaming the night before.

An April prayer vigil for Nogwaza may have drawn one or more of the assailants in the killing, the release said. Young men at the gathering were heard to utter anti-gay epithets, the release reported.

"Police and other South African officials fail to acknowledge that members of the LGBT community are raped, beaten, and killed simply because of how they look or identify, and they are attacked by men who then walk freely, boasting of their exploits," Nath stated. "If the police and other state officials do not act swiftly, it will only be a matter of time before they have to account for their failure to the family and friends of the next lesbian who is beaten and killed in Kwa-Thema."