Woman who was told daughter died during birth allegedly given body of baby boy to bury by Sebokeng hospital

After being told she had given birth to a stillborn baby girl, a 29-year-old Sebokeng woman was shocked to discover just hours before the funeral the hospital had given her a body of a baby boy to bury.

Tlalane Motaung, sister of the grieving mother, told TimesLIVE “she was in pain, was crying throughout the night and was not sleeping” due to the ordeal. 

Tlalane said she had accompanied her sister, Ntsebeng Motaung, to Sebokeng Hospital on April 28, arriving at 3am. 

Thirteen minutes later, her sister sent her a 'please call me'. She called back and heard the devastating news.

“She said to me she had had the baby — a girl — but the [nurse] had told her the baby is dead,” said Tlalane. 

Ntsebeng said to her: “I gave birth to the baby but she didn't cry and the sister showed me the baby and told me it was a girl and I said 'yes I can see'.”

“The sister said to her she was dead and left with the baby,” Tlalane said.

Tlalane said she then received another message from her sister telling her to fetch the body as instructed by the nurse.

However, Tlalane told Ntsebeng to tell the nurse no mortuary was open at that hour and that she would make arrangements when they opened.

“She was discharged about 10am. My brother fetched her. On Saturday morning, we went to the undertaker and explained the situation. They said to us that the government mortuary doesn't open on a weekend and on holidays so they will have to go on Tuesday to collect the body” she said.

On Tuesday, May 2, Tlalane said her sister and mother went to the hospital mortuary and the baby's body, which was already wrapped, was released to them. 

“When the undertaker arrived they went to the people at the hospital morgue with the papers to release the body. The undertaker confirmed the body through the paper he took from Tlalane. There was a paper attached to the plastic which showed that the baby belonged to Ntsebeng,” she said.

The body was taken to their private mortuary and was expected to be buried the next day — May 3.

The following morning,, Ntsebeng and her cousin arrived at the mortuary to bathe the body as part of a traditional ritual in preparation for burial. 

When they unwrapped the body, they discovered it was a boy instead of a girl.

They immediately alerted the family.

“The undertaker was also amazed and suggested we go back to the hospital morgue and find out what is happening,” Tlalane said.

Tlalane said the official at the hospital mortuary told them it was procedure for him to receive bodies already wrapped with a paper with information attached.

“We understood that it was their protocol, and we then went to ward 6 as he advised. They also couldn't understand how it happened and checked the file. Everything in there indicated  the baby was female. The hospital also called the sister who helped Ntsebeng to give birth and she confirmed she gave birth to a baby girl,” she said.

The hospital claimed it had only recorded one birth on that day — that of Ntsebeng's stillborn baby girl. 

“We went to the mortuary with the sisters to check if maybe there is a baby girl in the mortuary. We got there and there were no stillborn babies at the morgue. We asked them what to do with the baby that we left at our private morgue. They said we must fetch him and bring him back. Our undertaker went back and fetched the body of the baby and took him back to the government hospital morgue,” said Tlalane. 

The family opened a case at the Sebokeng police station on May 4.

Gauteng police spokesperson, Mavela Masondo confirmed that a case of contravention of the Births and Death Registration Act had been opened.

Masondo said an investigations was under way and no arrests had been made yet.

Tony Mathe of Marweshe Attorneys said they have taken instruction from Ntsebeng to bring an urgent application to compel the Department of Health to investigate the missing body of the baby girl and identify the corpse of the boy that was handed to her.

“We are engaging the police as well to speedily investigate what transpired and locate the baby urgently. Perpetrators must be brought to book and convicted urgently. This will also curb future crimes of this nature. It is very disappointing, I must say, that the police have not even contacted our client with regards to the case of a missing person that was already registered with them,” Mathe said.

Mathe said should police fail to execute their constitutional duties, their instruction is to compel them through the high court.

“No form of incompetence or sluggish performance will be tolerated in this matter, the baby must be found and returned to her mother urgently,” he said.

The Gauteng health department confirmed it had been made aware of the incident.

Spokesperson for the department Motalatale Modiba said its quality assurance team was working on the case to ensure there was closure for the family.

“There has already been a redress meeting with the family on  May 5 where the family was offered psychosocial services that they can access whenever they are ready to attend the session. Quality assurance is currently engaging the family to finalise the issue of conducting DNA tests which will help settle this matter. The process cannot proceed until we get consent for the patient.” he said.

However, the family claimed staff memberswere rude to them during the meetingand insisted the baby's body was not there.

Modiba said the procedure usually followed for stillborn babies was that hospital mortuary staff receive the body from the ward in a sealed body bag with tags.

They then allocate the fridge number for the body and capture the information in a mortuary register.

“Upon the release of the body, the mortuary clerk completes the necessary documents (i.e. BI1663) and do the formal handover to the family’s private undertaker for further management (identification and collection of the body),” he said.

The family now wonders if the baby was really dead.

“We are no longer sure what happened because the wrong body they brought has my sister's name on the tags. We are confused but the tags can be easily altered,” Tlalane said.

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