GUTJWA – It was a normal Friday for the family of five in this village outside KaBokweni until they heard a child screaming from the outside room, and ran to check.

According to Ms Sonto Khumalo, a 33-year-old mother of two, she heard her older son scream her name and when they went out they were stunned to see the room on fire.

“I could not believe my eyes when I saw the blaze and felt helpless as I could not do anything to stop it,” she added.

The family got the shock of their lives when they found out that the six-year-old son was the one who started the fire and ran away to hide in the neighbour’s house. The little boy said he had found a box of matches lying around and without any thought, he lit it and threw it on the bed because it started to burn his hand.

The other children who were playing outside when the 6-year-old started the fire, told how he came running from the room he shared with some of the relatives. “He didn’t say anything, he just ran and after a while we saw the smoke and that’s when we cried out because it was scary and the flames were huge,” they related.

By the time the firefighters came to the scene, it was already too late. The family had lost everything to the disastrous blaze.

“Now we have to start afresh. I’m unemployed and my two boys are at school – they lost everything in the fire and so did my niece and I,” said Khumalo.

“Two beds, uniforms, school stationery, clothes, ID books, birth certificates and so much important stuff has been consumed by the fire,” she sobbed.