9 [10] However, even assuming that there was due compliance with the above provisions of the Criminal Procedure Act, the conviction of the appellant could not be sustained on the evidence. This case is one of those cases where even on the merits there were clear and blatant misdirections by the trial court. Only a few of those will be mentioned below, to illustrate the point. [11] The cautionary rule was applicable to the evidence of the complainant. He was a single witness to the alleged indecent assault and he was very young when the offences were allegedly committed and during the trial. It appears, however, that the court merely paid lip service to the cautionary rule because it ignored several contradictions in his own testimony and that of the other State witnesses. His evidence was confusing and very difficult to follow. The charge sheet seems to refer to a single incident of indecent assault that occurred between the years 2000-2004, yet the complainant when he testified started by relating several incidents of sexual abuse that allegedly occurred when he was still six years old. He could not state specifically when those incidents occurred. Nor was it clear from the evidence of the complainant or that of his mother or grandmother when the first or the last incident occurred. The other concern is that according to him he was neither invited by the appellant nor coerced to visit the appellant’s home, yet he was unable to explain why he kept on going back to the appellant’s home at his own instance for at least the four years stipulated in the charge sheet. [12] Whilst I accept that it is not unusual for young children to experience difficulties when relating to the court what actually happened with the precision expected of an adult, especially pertaining to incidents concerning sexual behaviour as well as incidents that occurred a while ago. The need for caution cannot be ignored. In Viveiros v S [2000] 2 All SA 86 (A) para 2, this court stated: ‘In view of the nature of the charges and the age of the complainants it is well to remind oneself at the outset that, whilst there is no statutory requirement that a child’s evidence must be corroborated, it has long been accepted that the evidence of young children should be treated