The shack in Middelpos, Saldanha Bay, where Joshlin lived with her mother Kelly and her
three-year-old sister. (David Harrison/MG)
A month after six-year-old Joshlin Smith disappeared from her home in an informal settlement in Middelpos, Saldanha Bay, on the West Coast, her community is still clinging to the hope that she will be found alive.
But the air was thick with worry when the Mail & Guardian visited this week, speaking to neighbours who have been holding a daily vigil on a quiet street connecting Middelpos and Diazville since the little girl went missing on 19 February.
“We are all a community here. We take care of one another and now we will stand together to bring Joshlin home,” a resident, who declined to be named, told the M&G.
Others in the group weighed in about a child they described as “talkative”, “loving” — and not shy to knock on their doors to ask for a slice of bread or some rice when she was hungry.
Although cases of children going missing are fairly common in South Africa, Joshlin’s disappearance has garnered national, and even some international, attention since her mother Kelly Smith notified neighbours that she could not find her child, whom she said she had left in the care of her boyfriend.
After Saldanha Bay residents staged a protest and led search operations through the town to find Joshlin, Police Minister Bheki Cele visited the area, promising that sufficient resources would be allocated to the task.
Two weeks after her daughter’s disappearance, police arrested Smith, her boyfriend Jacquen “Boeta” Appollis, Steveno van Rhyn and traditional healer Phumza Sigaqa on charges of human trafficking and kidnapping related to the missing girl. Police later withdrew the charges against Sigaqa, citing a lack of evidence.
This came after Western Cape police said they had found blood-stained clothes in the Middelpos area, near where Joshlin resided with her mother and her three-year-old sister.
The clothes were sent for forensic analysis but police have not released information about whether the blood belonged to the missing child.
Although social media has been awash with speculation that Smith sold Joshlin for R20 000 for muthi, no evidence has come to light to support this claim.
This week, Joshlin’s neighbours said they found it difficult to believe Smith could have sold her, calling her a “loving mother” who always had her children by her side when she walked down the dusty roads.
The informal settlement in Middelpos, Saldanha Bay, on the West Coast near Cape Town, where six-year-old Joshlin Smith went missing a month ago. Photo: David Harrison
“Wherever you saw Kelly, she was with her daughters, so it is hard to believe that, if she did sell Joshlin, what could have been going through her mind at that time,” said one resident, who also declined to give their name.
Smith, Appollis and Van Rhyn are expected back in the Vredenburg magistrate’s court on 13 May for further questioning.
A fourth person, Lourencia Lombaard, who has supposedly made a confession relating to Joshlin’s disappearance, will be back in the same court on 25 March for a bail application.
Lombaard appeared briefly on Monday on charges of kidnapping and human trafficking but requested representation from Legal Aid before the case resumes. She was reportedly the last person to see the child before her 19 February disappearance.
According to Saldanha Bay councillor Vernon Vraagom, who is leading the search operation, Joshlin skipped school on that day because she was unwell.
“There is a bit of scepticism on when Joshlin actually might have gone missing because Kelly started looking for Joshlin on Sunday, 18 February,” Vraagom said.
According to eyewitnesses, before Joshlin’s disappearance, she was seen on several occasions walking with her mother’s boyfriend from an area notorious for crime.
In a statement just after Joshlin went missing, police said they were investigating the people who had close contact with the child around the time.
Although the charges against traditional healer Sigaqa have been dropped, she is in protective custody over fears for her safety, given the community’s anger.
Sigaqa told News24 that she had been “viciously” interrogated by the police about whether she had sold Joshlin.
“I have small children of my own … I could never even think of trafficking someone else’s child that I have never even met,” it quoted her as saying.
Saldanha Bay residents told the M&G they believed Sigaqa had information that could help find Joshlin.
“Kelly had a close group of friends, who are all now the accused in this case, and they definitely know what happened to that little girl — they just need to tell us where she is,” Vraagom said.
Some residents believe Joshlin, who was known in the community for her distinctive blue eyes and blonde hair, had been offered as part of a ritual that would elevate the status of the sangoma.
“We think she was offered as a sacrifice because she was light in complexion and very young,” one of them told the M&G.
Other members of the community speculated that an increase in the number of sangomas in the Middelpos area could point to a human trafficking syndicate.
“Saldanha has a sangoma problem but it could be possible that the sangoma story is just a distraction into getting Joshlin into human trafficking.
“Joshlin might be the first of many more cases to come,” Vraagom said.
Saldanha Bay police debunked this, saying that they had not had any kidnapping cases, or sangoma-related incidents, in the area which would suggest that Joshlin’s disappearance could be related to the activity of a syndicate.
Joshlin’s father returned to his mother’s home in Saldanha Bay from the Northern Cape, where he resides, after news spread of his daughter’s disappearance. He has since gone back to the Northern Cape.
Residents in the community in Saldanha Bay, who have been gathering every night at 8pm to pray for Joshlin’s safe return, are angry that the police have not been communicating with them on developments in the case.
“We just want to know where she is — that’s all — and whoever has the answers needs to tell us, so we can have some sort of closure,” resident Wendy Davids told the M&G.
Concerned members of the close-knit community have been gathering daily. Photo: David Harrison
On Tuesday, preschoolers gathered in an open field outside Diazville, holding up placards about children’s rights in relation to Joshlin’s disappearance. The gathering was also a nod to Human Rights Day, which South Africa commemorated on Thursday, 21 March.
“We are trying to teach them their rights from a young age, so that they can grow up to become advocates for themselves,” Cheryl Muller, a pre-grade teacher at OppieGaloppie Vital Connection told the M&G.
She said while the young children in the community could not fully understand Joshlin’s disappearance, it had influenced the curriculum structure at the nursery school.
“As teachers, we are trying now to teach our young learners safety measures — like not talking to strangers and so forth — but it is difficult because we come from such a close-knit community where we always talk and visit each other,” the teacher said.
According to police statistics on missing persons released in June, nearly 4 000 children have been reported missing in South Africa since 1995. Of these, about 3 712 have still not been found.
“Child safety should be a priority with parents and guardians because children are vulnerable and get taken advantage of by people they should be able to trust,” said Bianca van Aswegen, a criminologist and national co-ordinator of Missing Children South Africa.
The organisation helps look for missing children and, according to its statistics, has a 77% success rate in finding them.
However, the rest are either never found, have been trafficked or are found dead.