Everson Luhanga
When six-year-old Kwanda Dladla was last seen alive, he was playing with his friends in the yard. Then he accidentally smashed the headlight of a nearby parked car.
And that is what cost him his life. His body was found eight days later floating in the Jukskei River.
After damaging the car, a man, enraged with the children, appeared and allegedly began lashing Kwanda with a belt.
Kwanda then managed to flee from the man.
Kwanda’s aunt, Nonhlanhla, told Scrolla.Africa that when Kwanda’s mother heard about the damage her son had caused, she went out to get him to hear what happened.
“Mama, I didn’t do it,” Kwanda said to his mother as he disappeared among the narrow passages of the packed Alexandra streets.
“Her mother tried to catch him but Kwanda was too fast for his mother who is having a small baby at the moment,” said Nonhlanhla.
She said that was the last time they saw the young boy.
Nonhlanhla said that the police and members of the community teamed up and spent the next eight days searching diligently for the young boy.
On June 16, his body was found by a passerby dumped in the Jukskei River in Alexandra, Johannesburg.
Nonhlanhla said the eight days spent searching for Kwanda was the most difficult period of the family’s life.
“Every day, it felt like Kwanda was going to knock on the door. Sometimes his mother told us that she was having dreams that her son had come home only to wake up to an empty home without him.
“We were worried about his whereabouts and what he was eating. We didn’t know what happened and we still don’t know what killed him,” she said.
Nonhlanhla said the post-mortem results suggested that the young boy was badly beaten, and had visible bruises.
“When we found him, he was still bleeding,” she added.
The family said they are hoping that the police investigations will bring them closure about what happened.
“All we need as a family is a closure, as to why the young soul was brutally murdered. If it was for the car headlight, surely, we were going to pay for it. What killed Kwanda?”
Alexandra police spokesman Sergeant Simphiwe Mbatha said police opened an inquest docket for investigations. No arrests have so far been made.
