More than two months after the disappearance of six-year-old Joshlin Smith, during which he tried to avoid the news of the missing child, the case has brought back painful memories for #SliceofGasant columnist Gasant Abarder.
In another life, some 20 years ago, I was immersed in an advocacy campaign involving missing children who were later found dead. During my investigation as a journalist in the area known as Greater Blue Downs, I spoke to several of the little victims’ parents – by then numb from pain, guilt and trauma.
The campaign created in the new newspaper I worked for led to tracts of alien Port Jackson bush being cut down in Delft, Mfuleni, Eersterivier and Blackheath in Cape Town. The ‘Bush of Evil’, as the tabloid newspaper called it, was the dumping ground for murdered children who had been reported missing. The dense bush was allowed to grow wild to hold down the shifting sands where playgrounds should have been built.
In the newsroom of the then-newly founded Daily Voice newspaper, my colleagues and I had a rather off-colour theory. Our ‘theory’ was that kids with big ears went missing, based on police identikits or the last picture taken of the child. What is more, their parents dressed them funny. It wasn’t uncommon to have a child wearing brown pants and a purple top to go missing.
The ridiculous ‘theory’ was, of course, a coping mechanism to distract us from the evil we were dealing with. Our campaign eventually forced the City of Cape Town to bulldoze the invasive bush to rid the area of the cover for kidnappers and killers at the behest of the community.
Yesterday morning, on Family Day, as I scrolled through a news feed, I happened on the story of Joshlin Smith. The news item was threadbare and I googled the case to read more. I found myself back in my rabbit hole I had abandoned 20 years ago.
The six-year-old Grade 1 child has regular-sized ears. Her clothing, said to have been found bloodied by detectives, matched. There was no bush, just pure evil.
The story from Saldanha Bay is a plot so far out it could be a Netflix thriller. The child’s pregnant mother and her boyfriend are in custody and court. There are claims of kidnapping for body parts, a charge of trafficking, a recently released sangoma and whispers of a drug debt. Opportunistic politicians – one offering a R1-million reward for information, ‘no questions asked’ – have turned the search for Joshlin into an election platform.
I have a six-year-old daughter who is in Grade 1, just like Joshlin. She and her older siblings are the reason I have avoided this story. If anything happened to them, I’d lose my mind. My family live in a fortress in an area where nothing escapes the scrutiny of the neighbourhood watch. I could be bending over to tie my shoelaces while taking a walk and this little development would be reported on the chat.
My children don’t know what it is like to play hopscotch or ride their bikes in the street. They’re not sharp the way I was when I was growing up in Mitchell’s Plain. We can’t let them play outside because there are evil people out there. We’re protected by an electric fence, a 9-camera surveillance system and a burglar alarm linked to armed response.
Our fortress is called privilege. It is a privilege Joshlin didn’t have but wouldn’t have needed because the people accused of kidnapping her are her own parents.
This is the society we have become 30 years into our democracy. We have let down the most vulnerable among us, the children. It is the single biggest indicator of a failed state. Of course, there were such cases and even serial killers of children pre-1994. But advancements in policing and DNA tracing mean these cases should be anomalies and not the norm.
On its website, the NPO, Missing Children South Africa, writes, ‘Children go missing daily in South Africa. According to the last figures released by the South African Police Service (SAPS) Missing Persons Bureau for 2013, children go missing every five hours. No recent statistics have been released by SAPS since 2013.
‘Missing Children South Africa’s statistic indicates that 77% of children are found. Sadly, this still leaves us with at least 23% of the children being either never found, trafficked or found deceased. Children are also the most vulnerable victims of gender-based violence.’
Twenty years after a successful advocacy journalism campaign rid an area of the bushy cover for kidnappers and killers in Greater Blue Downs, I realise we were just addressing the symptom. Bushes don’t kidnap and kill people. People kidnap and kill people.
It leaves me feeling numb with pain, guilt and trauma. It is my hope that those we entrust with our safety and security are motivated by this pain, guilt and trauma to find little Joshlin.
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Picture: Andre Truter / Facebook