The night-walkers of Uganda

56

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‘Angel of Soweto’ a fraud, TV show 
claims
Celebrity donors backed woman who set up 
school for traumatised orphans
 
by Chris McGreal in Johannesburg
Many famous people, including American talk 
show host Oprah Winfrey and Nelson Mandela, 
have given millions of dollars to help South 
African orphans and street children. They gave 
the money to the woman who cared for them and 
called her the “Angel of Soweto”. The children 
she helped called her Mama Jackie. 
The children talked about the terrible lives they 
were living. Their parents were dead. They had 
to work as prostitutes to get money to buy food 
for their younger brothers and sisters. When they 
heard these terrible stories, many people gave 
a lot of money to Mama Jackie Maarohanye and 
her Ithuteng Trust school. The school gave the 
poor orphans and street children somewhere to 
live and it also gave them an education. Oprah 
Winfrey gave the school $1m during a visit last 
year, and organisations like the US National 
Basketball Association also donated a lot of 
money. “I think Mama Jackie is an angel on 
earth,” said Winfrey. 
But now the school is closed. Winfrey, together 
with Mr Mandela and Bill Clinton, has asked for 
copies of a South African television film that says 
Ms Maarohanye told pupils to make up stories 
about murdered parents and poverty in order to 
get money. The film also says that the money 
people gave for the children’s education was 
missing and that they had very little to eat. 
The television film was called Carte Blanche. It 
showed that pupils who said their parents were 
dead are now living with them, and that those 
who said they were living on the streets never 
left home. 45 children from the Ithuteng school 
travelled to the US five years ago as guests of 
Bill and Hillary Clinton. One of the group said 
they had to go to the United Nations and tell false 
stories about their lives. “We went to the United 
Nations and [Ms Maarohanye] told us to cry ... 
she told us to cry more than the other days we 
were crying,” said the student. 
Carte Blanche first filmed at the school five 
years ago and went back to talk to some of the 
same children. Many said their stories were 
not true. In 2001 Lebogang Makheta said that 
both her parents were killed in political violence. 
“Someone killed my mother with a spear and 
shot my father,” she said. Now Lebogang says 
that wasn’t true. 
“Mama Jackie told me what to say when they 
asked me questions. She said my answers 
would help to get money for the school”, says 
Lebongang. She also told the programme in 
2001 that she used drugs and knew gangsters. 
“None of that was true. It was all lies, just lies,” 
she now says. 
Lebogang’s mother, Phyllis Makheta, went to the 
school and was surprised when they told her that 
her daughter was an orphan. “I was there in the 
school. I don’t understand English very well, but I 
asked Jackie, why these children are crying and 
saying they are orphans, but we [their parents] 
are here. She said: Don’t worry, it is a play.” 
Five years ago Lindiwe Thusi told Carte Blanche 
that she saw her father’s body with his head 
cut off. She now says: “Mama Jackie gave us 
a piece of paper with those words written on 
it.” When different people came we had to start 
crying and tell that whole story,” she told Carte 
Blanche. Lindiwe says her father is alive and in 
the army. She also said that she told lies when 
she said she worked as a prostitute to earn 
money to feed her sisters.
Ms Maarohanye did not want to answer 
questions but she told Carte Blanche that she 
had not done anything wrong. But she couldn’t 
explain why she told the programme Lebogang 
Makheta’s parents were dead or that Lindiwe 
Thusi’s father had been killed. She said she 
never forced students to repeat false stories. “I 
never pushed a child. I have never put a gun on 
a child’s neck. I have never done that. You can 
never prove that I have done that.”