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Gender-Based Violence  |  Femicide  |  Online Safety

Zimbabwean Woman Killed on Facebook Dating in Soweto, South Africa

Langelihle Thobekile Moyo left Plumtree, Zimbabwe, to meet a man she trusted from the internet. She never came home. Her death is a warning South Africa can no longer afford to ignore.

By Collen MakumbirofaJohannesburg, South Africa  |  June 2025

Langelihle Thobekile Moyo

Plumtree, Zimbabwe  —  Soweto, South Africa

Langelihle Thobekile Moyo, whose life was taken after meeting a man known only as “Teeman” through Facebook Dating. — Photo sourced from family/social media.

She had dreams. She had a family who loved her. She had a phone number her relatives could reach her on — until suddenly, on 5 June, they could not. Langelihle Thobekile Moyo, a young Zimbabwean woman from Plumtree, is dead. She was lured across an international border by a man she met on Facebook Dating, known only by the name “Teeman,” and she was killed at his hands in Soweto, South Africa.

According to family members, Langelihle’s ordeal began — as so many tragedies do today — not with a threat, but with attention. A man online expressed interest. He was warm. He made promises. He even paid for her transport from Zimbabwe to South Africa, a gesture that, in hindsight, reveals how calculated this predator truly was. When someone pays for your journey, you feel indebted. You feel chosen. You lower your guard. That is exactly what he counted on.

“She came to South Africa full of hope. She left Zimbabwe trusting a stranger’s word. She deserved protection — from her host, from this country, from us all.”

— Collen Makumbirofa, Advocacy Journalist

Family members grew concerned on the 5th of June when Langelihle went completely silent — no calls, no WhatsApp messages, nothing. That silence, so familiar to the families of the missing, was not digital noise. It was the sound of a life extinguished. She had been found dead in Soweto. The man known as “Teeman” is believed to be responsible.

The Broader Crisis

Langelihle is not the first. She will not, tragically, be the last — not unless something fundamentally changes about how we treat online safety, how we hold perpetrators accountable, and how seriously South Africa takes the epidemic of violence against women that has engulfed this nation.

Facebook Dating, Tinder, Instagram, and dozens of other platforms have become hunting grounds for predators who prey on loneliness, hope, and economic vulnerability. Foreign nationals — particularly women from neighbouring countries — are at heightened risk. They arrive in a country they do not know, with no local support network, no knowledge of the streets, and a false sense of security built entirely on a stranger’s digital persona. When something goes wrong, they are invisible. They have no one to call.

⚠ A Warning to All Women

Online love can be a lie constructed to lure you into danger. If someone you have only met online offers to pay for your travel to another country — especially one as violent as South Africa — treat that offer as a warning, not a gift. Verify identities. Share your location with trusted family. Never travel alone to meet someone for the first time. Your life is worth more than a flight ticket.

South Africa has the third highest rate of femicide in the world. It is a country where a woman is killed by an intimate partner every three hours. It is a country where the justice system is overwhelmed, where cases drag on for years, where families bury their daughters and wait — sometimes forever — for accountability. Into this environment, Langelihle walked trusting a man whose only credential was a Facebook profile.

Justice & The Law

A Call for Justice

The perpetrator — or perpetrators — responsible for Langelihle Thobekile Moyo’s death must be found, arrested, prosecuted, and punished to the fullest extent of the law. No excuses. No delays. No disappearing dockets.

South Africa reinstated serious sentencing frameworks in the past, yet violent crime has only grown bolder. The time has come for a national reckoning with capital punishment. When the state cannot deter murder through imprisonment alone, it must ask hard questions about whether its leniency is itself a form of complicity in the deaths of women like Langelihle.

May this young woman’s name be remembered. May her family find justice. And may every official, every platform, every citizen who reads these words feel the weight of responsibility to act — before another family in Plumtree, or anywhere else, is silenced by grief.

Rest in peace, Langelihle Thobekile Moyo. You came to South Africa full of hope. This country failed you. We will not forget your name.

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Collen Makumbirofa

Founder & Director — Makumbirofa Farms (Pty) Ltd

Advocacy Journalist  |  Human Rights Advocate  |  Johannesburg, South Africa

🌐 www.makumbirofafarms.co.za
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