‘Mama, bye... see you in heaven’

SUICIDE NOTE: 'I WANT TO KILL MYSELF BECAUSE OF THE BULLYING FROM MY TEACHER'

- Jabulile Mbatha

Nompumelelo Mbatha's heart still breaks and the tears still flow when she recalls that her son committed suicide because his teacher bullied him for being gay. Sibusiso Mbatha, 12, attended Khehlekile Primary School in Thokoza where a teacher, Simon Dhlamini, allegedly told him to leave his “gayism” in the township.

Although Dhlamini was disciplined and suspended for two months for his conduct, he was reappointed at the school just weeks before the first anniversary of Sibusiso's death. Mbatha said: “My child's life has ended forever, yet Dhlamini gets a short suspension and goes back to teaching in the same school where he was homophobic. Dhlamini is a murderer.

»Dhlamini allegedly told 12 year old to leave his 'gayism' in the township.

“If he had not said those words to my child, he would have never taken his life.”

On 23 October last year, Sibusiso was involved in an altercation with another pupil and was sent to Dhlamini, who publicly reprimanded the two boys and allegedly insulted Sibusiso.

Mbatha said Sibusiso came home looking devastated. “He told his cousin that he was traumatised by what Dhlamini had said.

“Then, he sat in his room and later said he wanted to play jumping rope outside… only for us to later be called out to find that he had hanged himself in the bathroom outside.”