“He can take all of her body parts, but the biggest part he can't take is Bokgabo's soul.”
These were the words of a grieving mother, Tsholofelo Poo, as she spoke in front of a packed Wattville Daycare Centre in Benoni, on the East Rand, as she paid tribute to her slain four-year-old daughter Bokgabo Poo.
Poo, who struggled to hold her emotions as speaker-after-speaker spoke of the devastation everyone had been going through at the loss of Bokgabo, started her tribute to her daughter with a chant: “Long live Bokgabo, long live”.
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With a defiant and spirited look, the mother spoke of how the death of her daughter has touched not only the community of Wattville but many people around the world. “I have gained a very powerful ancestor in Bokgabo. I'm weak inside but my flesh is strong, I can no longer cry because the community has done that on my behalf,” said Poo.
Father Themba Seya, who gave a spiritual word of comfort to the family, said he has made a plea to the prison officials to allow him to have a word with the accused to convince him to open up and tell them where the rest of Bokgabo's body parts are.
“I want to pray with him and speak to his spirit; I want to touch his soul. If I can just have a moment with him, man to man, face to face. I believe God can make him confess,” he said.
The packed hall was charged with emotions as Seya made an analogy of Bokgabo being led to her death with a sweet in her hand to the story in the Bible of Abraham as he lead Isaac to sacrifice him.
Charmaine Vilane from Action Society spoke about how violence against women and children has become a pandemic outside of Covid-19. “We now need knives, guns and other sort of weapons to fight this pandemic, no more mask but weapons,” said Vilane.
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