Grade 12, Lesedi La Thuto
It’s been long since this lockdown started, yes. I have been following the precautions but I’m turning 16 tomorrow. I can’t stay indoors on my sweet sixteenth birthday. No! Mr. President will have to forgive me. Little did Nthabiseng know that she’s not only going to be ignoring the lockdown precautions, but actually digging her own grave.
‘Nthabi, if it was not for this lockdown, I was going to throw you a huge birthday party uyakhula kaloku mtanami,’ Nthabiseng’s mother said.
‘What’s stopping us? I have rights, you can’t stop me! I mean I can’t place my sweet 16 plans on hold because of this lockdown, no mama’, shouted Nthabi.
Her mother was not against the fact that Nthabi wanted to celebrate her birthday, but resisted her doing it during this crisis. Nthabi however, only wanted to celebrate her birthday with her friends and did not want to hear anything else. She quickly went to her room and began writing her suicide note. ‘Mama ndiya xolisa but if I’m not going to celebrate my birthday, let me not live in this cruel world. I’m never given a chance to celebrate myself, not ever! intoni Mama? This is the last time I bother you, goodbye. Maybe God will treat me better.’
After writing the letter, she bathed and called an uber. The uber arrived within 30 minutes. ‘Iphi I-mask sis,’ the uber driver asked. ‘Ufuna imali or imask?’ Nthabi replied in a very arrogant way while she got in the car. When she got to her friend’s place, they planned that they going to Mbona tavern, where they sell alcohol illegally. They then called an uber. Again, within 30 minutes the uber got there, and it was around 11pm.
‘Nibahle bo sisi’ the uber driver shouted. There was something uncommon about the uber driver: he would speak a different language when answering a call. He then headed in the wrong direction, straight into a dark place. ‘Uyaphi bhuti?’ Nthabi asked. ‘I just want to fill up petrol, and then take you to your destination,’ he replied.
He then headed to the bushes where there was a car waiting for him. Nthabi and her friend got really scared. ‘I got two and they are still fresh,’ the uber driver shouted to the other guys in the car that was waiting for him. ‘ Balethe,’ they shouted back. He then opened the door for Nthabi and her friend, grabbing them so hard. ‘Siyeke!‘ Nthabi’s friend shouted. He didn’t care about them shouting. One dark guy came to help the uber driver get them out of the car.
They then laid them down and told them to undress or they were going to kill them. ‘Bhuti, I beg of you, please let us go. We won’t tell anybody what happened,’ Nthabi pleaded with tears in her eyes. ‘We will start with you. it seems like you have a big mouth.’ The other guys also turned against them. Nthabi tried to shout but there was no one to help them since everybody was on lockdown.
‘Bizani abanye!’ shouted the uber driver. Immediately after he said that, two dark guys came out of the car and they took Nthabi and her friend to the car. They were both bleeding but the dark guys did not care. They blindfolded Nthabi and her friend and drove them to Mamelodi lake. It was already 01.22am. The dark guys took Nthabi and left her friend in the car. They stabbed her several times and shot her with 3 bullets. ‘God, where are you in such situations?’, shouted Nthabi’s friend after hearing the gun shots.
Fortunately the lake security guards heard the gun shots and quickly rushed to where the sound came from. ‘Hee madoda, sukani lapho!’, the guard shouted. The guard then headed to the car to see what was going on. His eyes filled with tears when he saw Nthabi’s mangled body lying down. ‘Yho mntana ka Shengu’, he shouted and quickly called Nthabi’s mother as they were neighbours. He explained everything to her and called the police, ambulance and other guards.
‘Usindile sisi’, he shouted looking at Nthabi’s friend. Nthabi’s mother ran to the room after the call because she could not believe what the security guard was saying. Three steps into the room, she found the note that Nthabi had left for her. ‘No, no no no, ‘she cried. ‘ Nthabi’s last note!’
When the police arrived at the lake, they all started to shout at Nthabi’s friend. ‘Don’t shout at me,’ she said, ‘I have rights’ she said. One of the police officers responded, ‘The only thing you know is that you have rights but you never reflect on your responsibilities! Rights are nothing without responsibilities! Look where rights with no responsibilities got you. Sisi, know the Constitution!’
After so much trauma, Nthabi’s friends could not handle it. She would get sleepless nights and had nightmares about her late friend, Nthabi. ‘ I learnt it the hard way,’ she said in a pleading voice.
KNOW YOUR RIGHTS BUT DO NOT FORGET YOUR RESPONSIBILITIES. STAY SAFE AND SAVE OUR CHILDREN.