A WOMAN accused of providing a schoolgirl from northern Namibia as a sexual partner for two men in the Okahandja district denied guilt on multiple charges of rape and human trafficking at the start of her trial in the Windhoek High Court yesterday.
Charged with four counts of rape, one count of attempted rape, and three charges of trafficking in persons, Tuufilwa Ndawina Jonas (33) did not give any plea explanation to judge Naomi Shivute after telling the judge she was pleading not guilty on all counts. The charges emanate from allegations that Jonas was involved in a scam that landed a schoolgirl from northern Namibia on Okahandja district farms where she was forced into becoming a sexual partner to two men.
The state alleges that Jonas approached the schoolgirl at a village in northern Namibia in April 2012, and advised her to leave school so that she could take up a job which Jonas said was available at Okahandja. In fact, though, Jonas had agreed with a certain John Puariune that she would procure a girl for him – which the girl found out only the next month, after she had arrived at Okahandja and Jonas told her that she had to go live with the man who had paid for her transport from the north, the state charges. Having arrived at the farm where Puariune was staying, the girl was allegedly forced to have sexual intercourse with him on several occasions. The state also alleges that Jonas fetched the girl from the farm two months later and instructed her to take up lodging with another man, which she refused to do.
Following that refusal, Jonas instructed the girl to go stay with a third man, identified only as one Nico in the indictment. Having been chased out of Jonas’ house, the girl went to stay with the said Nico, and was again raped on several occasions, the state charges. Jonas, who is being represented by Milton Engelbrecht, was arrested in November 2015. She has been in custody since then. Her trial is scheduled to continue today. State advocate Felistas Shikerete-Vendura is prosecuting.
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