In this image taken from AP
Television News, Oprah Winfrey listens to a question during a video
news conference Monday, Nov. 5, 2007, from an undisclosed
location.
Oprah Winfrey said Monday she wept for half an hour
when she heard a dorm matron was accused of abusing students at her
school for disadvantaged South African girls. She promised to
"clean house" starting with the headmistress.
Winfrey said officials at the Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy
for Girls hid facts and told students to "put on happy faces" and
not complain to her. Though she said she was not responsible for
hiring at the school, she said the screening process was inadequate
and "the buck always stops with me."
She spoke to reporters in South Africa by satellite from the
United States hours after the accused dormitory matron appeared in
court near Johannesburg.
Tiny Virginia Makopo, 27, was not asked to submit a formal plea.
But she said she was "not guilty" of the 13 charges of indecent
assault, assault and criminal injury against six students ages 13
to 15 and a 23-year-old fellow dormitory matron.
Makopo, who was arrested Thursday, was freed on US$450 bail and
ordered to return to court on December 13.
Superintendent Andre Neethling, from the police's sexual
offenses and child protection unit, said there were at least three
serious cases of indecent assault and that the alleged abuse had
taken place over four months.
The US$40 million school opened with much fanfare in January
with a ceremony attended by a cast of celebrities including Nelson
Mandela, Spike Lee, Sidney Poitier, Mariah Carey and Tina
Turner.
Before the allegations, Winfrey said she had told the pupils she
was the "momma bear" who would protect them.
Winfrey said she had been informed by the school's chief
executive, John Samuel, in early October that 15 girls had produced
a list of complaints including the sexual assault of a
classmate.
"When I first heard about it I spent about a half hour crying,
moving from room to room in my house," Winfrey told the news
conference, calling it "one of most devastating experiences of my
life."
The talk show host has spoken in the past of being raped by a
distant cousin at age 9 and then abused by three other men, trusted
family friends. She has campaigned for laws in the United States to
protect children from abusers.
(Agencies via China Daily November 6, 2007)
