Scourge of muti murders
HAS JOSLIN FALLEN PREY?
Difficult to determine the extent of such crimes – expert.
The disturbing claim that the missing Saldanha girl, Joslin Smith, was sold for muti, has put muti killings in South Africa under the spotlight again. Joslin, who is known as “the green-eyed girl” by members of her poor coastal community of Middelpos, in Diazville, disappeared on 19 February.
In a dramatic development in the tragic case of the six-year-old Joslin, her mother, Racquel “Kelly” Smith and her boyfriend Jacquin “Boeta” Appollis have been charged of human trafficking and kidnapping.
They appeared last Thursday, in the Vredenburg Magistrate’s Court, alongside their co-accused Steveno van Rhyn and Phumza Sigaqa, an alleged sangoma.
The state alleges that her mother instructed Appollis and Van Rhyn to sell Joslin to a traditional healer for R20 000 to be used in muti.
The practice of muti killings for body parts are founded in the belief that there is a limited amount of good luck in this world and if one wants to increase one’s wealth, health or luck, it must come at the expense of another.
Many muti murder victims are vulnerable young children whose body parts are thought to provide more potent medicine because they are “pure”.
According to Gauteng police spokesperson Selvy Mohlala, muti killings are particularly gruesome because the victims are dismembered while they are still alive. The screaming of a child while body parts are being chopped off is believed by some people to awaken magical powers.
On 21 May, 2022, the discovery of six-year-old Mpumalanga girl Bontle Mashiyane’s mutilated body in Mganduzweni near White River sent shock waves across the country.
Bontle went missing the same weekend as the late Hillary Gardee, the daughter of former Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) secretary-general Godrich Gardee. Her murder, too, is believed to have been linked to muti killing and the two bodies were recovered not too far from each other.
Bontle’s neighbour Ntombikayise Ngwenya, her boyfriend and serial offender Collen Hlongwane and their friend Thapelo Ngomane, sangoma Samuel Tsela and his son Philasande Tsela were charged with the little girl’s rape, murder and mutilation.
In a video circulated on social media, one of the suspects, Ngomane allegedly confessed to how they dismembered Bontle’s body and removed her womb and her knees on instruction of a sangoma.
He said that, at the time, wombs were in demand.
“For another child, a sangoma paid us R45 000 for body parts and for Mashiyane we were given R20 000,” he claimed.
Forensic psychologist Gérard Labuschagne was involved in more than 30 muti murder investigations during the time that he was the head of the Investigative Psychology Unit of the South African Police Service.
Crime statistics in South Africa only record muti murders within the general category of murder.
Labuschagne said it is therefore difficult to determine the extent of such crimes, especially because most often these murders occur in rural areas and may go unreported to the police.