LYDENBURG – The discovery of the remains of Rina Mosotho (3) has left her family shattered. Salteel Mosotho, her father, said that they begged the perpetrator to return their baby alive.

According to her parents they had hoped that she would still be alive and they feel crushed, thinking of the torture she could have endured before she died. “My wife and I made an announcement to the public requesting that they drop our daughter anywhere in the village,” he said.

The little girl went missing more than a month ago and her skeleton was found on a mountain cliff, several metres away from where the rescue team went searching for her.

“Now that we know that she will never return home, it breaks our hearts knowing that the people who killed our child are still out there living their lives as if nothing has happened. And the thought of not knowing what really happened to her before she died makes it worse,” he said.

“Since she disappeared we are constantly checking if our kids are safe,” he said.
Martha Mosotho, the mother of the little girl, said it kills her knowing her daughter had to go through all this and there was nothing she could do to stop it from happening.

“My child disappeared and we did everything we could possibly do to find her. When a community member told us that he saw human remains we wished it was not her,” she said.

It is alleged that the community members know what happened to her.
“Someone told me that they heard a child crying from one of the houses nearby, however in that house there’s no baby which is known to the community and when we went searching from house to house two families refused us entry.

I feel those two families had something to hide on that day, but they later allowed us to enter after the police had to intervene more than once,” said Mosotho.

Rescue workers confirmed finding her remains and they were sent for a post-mortem to gain more insight into the cause of death.

The family will only bury the remains of their little Rina after they receive the results.

The parents have urged the community to help them find the perpetrators.
“We urge you to help us put people responsible for her death behind bars,”he said.