BUTCHER OUT ON BAIL

The butchery manager charged with attempted murder for allegedly poisoning a laaitie is out on bail of R1 000 but the court ordered that he must bly weg from Woodlands, Mitchells Plain.

Nuruddin Tembe, 53, made his first brief court appearance at the Mitchells Plain Magistrates Court on 15 May which heard that management of Mitchell’s Moslem butchery is willing to take the accused back at work.

Tembe’s legal representative attorney Asghar Mia said: “What has happened since [11 May] is that there has been various protests, threats and even threats of burning and looting at the place of business where this incident happened.”

“Based on that, for the safety and security of the accused and other staff members, the employer is willing to take back the accused, but we will first let the court finalise whether he is allowed to go back.”

The court heard that there are klompie dinge that need to be investigated and several eye witnesses, however Mia said he and his client are ‘willing to work with SAPS to try and get the matter resolved’.

The court granted Tembe bail of R1 000 and his bail conditions are that he must bly weg from Woodlands, however should tensions in the community die down another application can be brought to the court to allow the accused to enter the area and return to work.

The laaitie, 17, who left school to assist his single mother make ends meet was pranked into drinking oven acid from a Sprite bottle by jaloers Tembe.

The victim was admitted to Groote Schuur hospital, was admitted to the ICU and put on life support, but was taken off critical status.

Kwaad aunties outside the court said they are disappointed that the accused was released on bail.

Mitchells Plain community member Raafiqah Ganger said: “At the end of the day, he is a danger to everybody in the community.

And as far as looting [of the butchery] is concerned there was no intention from any community members to loot.

“We stood there we made sure because we know that [the management] are in the community for so many years, but the frustration is that they mustn’t say that the people are looting.

“The stuff going on social media that is wrong people must remove that sh*t man. That is where we draw the line this is where the narratives change at the end of the day.”

Ganger added that the community wants to follow the correct procedure along with police officials and the butchery owner but made it duidelik that there was niks looting.

The case was postponed to 12 August for further investigation.