June Steenkamp arrives at Kgosi Mampuru Correctional Services Centre's Atteridgeville branch. Picture: James Mahlokwane
Pretoria - Oscar Pistorius has not been remorseful for killing Reeva Steenkamp and should be kept behind bars, said Reeva’s mother, June, ahead of Pistorius' parole hearing today.
Steenkamp arrived at Kgosi Mampuru Correctional Services Centre's Atteridgeville branch, where she met a crowd of local and international media who were eager to hear her views on Pistorius's plea to be released.
Steenkamp did not mince her words when she basically told the world that the Steenkamp family did not believe Pistorius was remorseful because he is yet to come clean by admitting that he meant to kill their daughter on Valentine’s Day in 2003.
Escorted by the family lawyer, Tania Koen, to oppose the parole bid that could see her daughter's killer released from prison within a couple of weeks, she reiterated that Reeva's father, Barry, also, did not get the feeling that Pistorius was remorseful.
The Steenkamp family lawyer, Tania Koen, speaks to the media at Oscar Pistorius's parole hearing. #OscarPistorius #Pistorius pic.twitter.com/bJfvEa0T8F
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Barry Steenkamp sat down with Pistorius for a meeting facilitated by the Department of Correctional Services as part of the Victim-Offender Dialogue Programme they implemented to strengthen their rehabilitation efforts.
It placed the victim at the centre of the rehabilitation process, while keeping correctional officials, as well as offenders, on either side of the victim.
"It is going to be tough to be in the same room with him," she said responding to a flood of media questions.
"I feel very stressed." Asked if she believed that Pistorius was remorseful after all this time locked away, she said: "No. Never."
Koen said: "First of all, it is a very traumatic experience as you can imagine. June has to face Oscar Pistorius again this morning. He is the killer of her daughter. To them that is a life sentence. He is eligible to be put on parole.
"They do not feel that he should be released. They feel he has shown no remorse. He has not been rehabilitated because had he been, he would have come clean and told the true story of what happened that night.
"The Supreme Court of Appeal found that he has not divulged everything that happened that night and that is the position that they (the family) also hold."
Pretoria News