Friends fear mother who fled deportation is dead

FRIENDS of a South African woman who disappeared a month ago, just hours before she was due to be deported, fear she may be dead.

Nteta Appiakorang has not been in direct contact with anyone in her adopted home town of Tralee, including her daughters aged 11 and eight.

Ms Appiakorang fled on the day she was to be deported back to South Africa, where her husband and son were killed in a politically motivated attack.

Gardaí believe she left for England. On the day after she disappeared, a person rang a friend of Ms Appiakorang to say the 38-year-old was in England and safe. But there has been no verification since.

Her friends remain deeply concerned. Deirdre Levi, who works at an asylum seeker support agency in Tralee, said: “You cannot be anything but worried. I am worried because I know how she lived for her children and I know the sort of mother she was.

“I know if she is alive, and I do say if, she must be overwrought and distressed. I cannot imagine what life must be like for her if she is alive.” Ms Appiakorang suffers from a serious illness that is life-threatening without proper medication.

Her two daughters, Senita and Yesunia, who had been expected to land back in South Africa the day before the new school term, instead returned to Moyderwell school in Tralee, where they have been for more than two years.

They will remain in Kerry for the time being, as it is unlikely they will be sent back to South Africa without their mother. Their father and brother, ethnic Zulus who were once involved with the opposition Inkatha movement, were both murdered.

Concern for her children was the reason Ms Appiakorang left, Ms Levi firmly believes. “Undoubtedly. If she goes back to South Africa she would have been ill and died without medication. That would have left the children orphans. That was her option.”

Ms Appiakorang left a note saying she wasn’t going back alive to South Africa. She had taken alcohol and tablets and there were fears for her safety.

Searches were carried out in Kerry but no trace of her was found.