Daily Sun (September 20 2013) - IT CLAIMS to be a home that cares for people with mental and physical disorders . . . But residents say the place is unsafe and dirty, and that frail, helpless patients are starved and abused.
DAILY SUN INVESTIGATED - AND YESTERDAY THE HOME WAS SHUT DOWN!
The house of horror - in extension 15, Sebokeng, in the Vaal, south of Joburg - is called the Reyaphela Home for Orphans and Mentally and Physically Challenged Patients. Alerted by residents, Daily Sun was shocked to find one inmate, a 19-year-old coloured boy known only as Kobie, a virtual skeleton, naked and sprawled on a bed!
Kobie is apparently paraplegic. He can't talk, walk or even sit up properly and his hands don't function. He only understands seSotho. According to residents, Kobie also suffered attacks from other patients. Nobody could say where he comes from.
Along with Kobie, Daily Sun found two elderly male patients who are mentally ill. There are two supposed caregivers on the site, Seipati (not her real name), a 17-year old orphan who first arrived at the home in 2011, and Neo Ntshala (27).
The teenage girl helps look after patients by bathing and dressing them, and cooking and cleaning for them. But she told Daily Sun one of the men at the centre repeatedly raped her.