Lydia Mutumwa is raising money to go back to Uganda. Photo: Tendai Bhiza.
18 March 2014
A 28-year-old Ugandan woman, Lydia Mutuwa, who came to South Africa hoping to get a job to look after her children and ailing mother, says her life has become even harder than the life she ran away from in her country of birth.
Mutuwa told Groundup that the father of her first four children deserted her in 2008 after infecting her with HIV. He cheated on her and he was abusive. She has been on medication ever since. She collects her medication at Delft day hospital once a month.
When she was still in Uganda in 2012, she became lovers with Tindo — a Zimbabwean nickname for Tendai — through a friend’s Facebook account. Tindo’s Facebook page no longer exists, and her friend, Brandy Naboyoya, who is also from Uganda, disappeared eight months ago.
Mutumwa says she was never concerned about not knowing her boyfriend’s real name. She was in love. All she was concerned about was getting a job in South Africa as she was promised by her boyfriend when she was still in Uganda.
In 2013, convinced she was in love, she met Tindo in Harare. They then crossed to South Africa illegally and used trucks to get to Cape town.
When they arrived in Cape town, they stayed in a house in Bellville with three men, the room divided by a curtain. Later, they moved to Delft. She took a job at a car wash in Belhar.
Tindo, she says, never showed her his work place or gave her his real name.
When she was six weeks pregnant, she disclosed to Tindo that she was HIV positive. He packed his stuff in her satchel, including her passport and other belongings, and left while she was away at work.
Her phone was stolen, and the boyfriend changed his number. She has no way to contact him. Their baby is now two-weeks old. But without identity documents, she is unable to get a birth certificate at the Department of Home Affairs. She only has a paper from Karl Bremer hospital stating when she delivered the child.
Mutuwa said, “I wanted to abort this baby but my heart said no … All I could think of is what if something goes wrong? Then I die leaving my children with my sick mother [in Uganda]. I cannot tell my mum what is going on here, because she has a heart problem. This will add to her stress. I am the only child. My mother separated from my father when she failed to have more babies. My father then married another woman.”
“For the past three months my cousins have been phoning to tell me how bad my mother’s healthy is, but I cannot tell them that I have another child here and I am struggling. My mother is sick and weak. Letting her know what is happening to me will greatly affect her health.”
Mutuwa is looking for piecework to raise money for transport to go back to Uganda. She wants to return to take care of her children.