From the newsroom of The Star, South Africa, Friday, May 27, 2005 .....

Family traumatised as decomposed body of missing deaf, mute girl found in veld in Soweto

By Lee Rondganger

Xolisiwa Makhubu vanished two days before her sixth birthday.

Yesterday, police found her severely decomposed body less than a kilometre from her home.

Deaf and mute, Xolisiwa had been missing since May 6. She had been playing with friends at a neighbour's house in Dlamini Extension, Soweto.

News of the discovery of her body in a densely vegetated patch of veld spread like wild fire through the community.

Throngs of curious onlookers converged on the banks along the veld. Detectives combed the area around the body for clues as anxious relatives waited nearby.

Khosi Twala, Xolisiwa's aunt, cried uncontrollably as police removed her niece's body in a blue body bag.

"We have been looking for her for three weeks. Why, why?" she cried as a friend tried to comfort her. Twala said the family had hoped that they would find her alive and had gone to great lengths to locate her.

"We did everything. We reported the case to the Moroka police station and we even had her photo published in (a newspaper). We were always hopeful that we would still find her, so this is a major shock."

Family members yesterday described Xolisiwa as a happy-go-lucky child who got on well with other children despite her handicaps.

Her grandfather, Ronnie Modikwane, said the family were traumatised by the incident and had not yet come to terms with her murder.

"She was playing next door when her grandmother called her to eat. She just vanished and nobody saw anything. It was a day before her mother was going to take her to town to buy her new clothes for her birthday," Modikwane said.

He added that, together with the police, the community searched the entire area for her without any luck.

"This is terrible. We were really hoping we would still find her alive."

Concerned neighbours flocked to Xolisiwa's home to pay their respects and offer the family their condolences.

"She was a beautiful child and did not deserve to die like this. I hope they catch the bastard," said one neighbour.

Phindi Twala, Xolisiwa's grandmother, described her as a pleasant child with few wants or needs.

"I am so sad about this. It is tragic and we are going to miss her very much."

Xolisiwa's mother, Thuli, was too distraught to speak to The Star.

Inspector Richard Munyai, spokesperson for the Soweto police, said a postmortem would be conducted to establish the cause of death.

"We do not know how she died as the body was very decomposed. We found her fully clothed and lying on her back. At this stage we do not know if she was sexually assaulted, but we cannot rule out the possibility," he said.

© 2005 The Star & Independent Online (Pty) Ltd. All rights reserved.

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