EDITORIAL | Another child horror killing — where are the politicians now that elections are over?

A month before the elections, five-year-old Ditebogo Junior Phalane was shot and killed in cold blood in a notorious section of Soshanguve township called Jukulyn. The nation was outraged. Politicians came out in their numbers to show they cared. But did they?

First, Gauteng premier Panyaza Lesufi visited the Phalane family, telling the nation he had asked the MEC for safety Faith Mazibuko to formally provide daily reports so he could keep the family updated on the investigation. He told us he registered his disappointment about there not being any arrests at that time, because he “didn’t want to make a routine visit. When visiting families, we must have answers,” noting, however, that police were following leads.

Importantly, Lesufi said the “resources needed by the police were made available. These are out of the ordinary resources. They are some gadgets, some tools and some personnel that are needed to follow up the leads to ensure they get the relevant information that they need.”

In short, our caring premier was not indifferent to the pain felt by the family and people of Soshanguve.

DA Gauteng premier candidate Solly Msimanga, who attended Ditebogo's funeral, said on social media that if people came together and provided information to the police, who should be well-resourced and held accountable, “we will be able to take back our streets and make our communities safe again.” The indirect dig at those in power not holding police accountable was clear, just as we are also clear his heart was in the right place about the family’s loss. The EFF, not to be outdone, also visited the family and reiterated their call for justice.

After relentless pressure and attention, three people were arrested. The trio of Elia Moeko (36), Ali Sithole (30) and Nido Gumbe (29) face charges of murder and robbery with aggravated circumstances. Others were arrested later.

There is nothing wrong with this kind of support that bereaved families receive, especially when their child, Ditebogo, was murdered in such a horrible manner while running towards his father who had just pulled into the family’s driveway. It was the inhumane and senseless murder of a helpless child. That this tragic killing and the subsequent support from politicians came in the weeks before a crucial election was taken as coincidental.

Now, when siblings Tinyiko (7) and Mpfumo Mashaba (4) are murdered inside their shack when they were home alone in the same township, the nation’s reaction is muted. The children’s age is almost the same as that of Ditebogo Phalane, they come from the same township, they all succumbed to different but similar senseless killings.

We are forced to ask: is the reason we don’t see an avalanche of politicians showing they care about the Mashaba siblings too simply because we no longer have an election around the corner?

It’s an uncomfortable question but one we must ask, because we know too well how opportunistic our politicians could be. It’s a cynical view, but one that is also rooted in reality, supported by countless images of what politicians did to get the approval of voters. We have seen them cook, help with washing of clothes and generally show people they cared.

To say though that they are now missing in action is not to assume that all politicians who demonstrated concern about how Ditebogo was killed and how Soshanguve had become a hellhole were not genuine.

Yet it is to acknowledge how hard it is to not think about the fact that elections are now over, politicians are now no longer as responsive as they were a month before the polls and how the Mashaba family now don’t have an endless stream of politicians coming to commiserate.

The killing of the Mashaba siblings was no less shocking. “You will die because your father loves money,” the kids were told before they were killed in cold blood. Their shack was set alight. When the mother arrived, she found “my older child hugging her teddy bear with a bullet in her stomach and the younger one beneath the bed as if she wanted to hide under it”.

There was a notable voice of justice and correctional services minister Ronald Lamola, who expressed outrage and condemned the killing of the Mashaba siblings as heinous and senseless. That many others are up to now reticent is, in a different way, tragic.