Giyani police officers arrested a 37-year-old woman in Kempton Park in Gauteng following the attack of an elderly woman and kidnapping and murder of an 11-year-old girl.

Limpopo police spokesperson Brigadier Motlafela Mojapelo says the woman was arrested days after the elderly woman was attacked in her house in Makgakgabatse village in the early hours of last Sunday morning. The young girl’s decomposing body was found in bushes at the Manganya Farm in Ga-Maphalla outside Giyani on Friday.

Mojapelo explains the 75-year-old woman was awoken by her daughter-in-law who had brought her two children for ancestral rituals in the company of an unknown man but that they had left soon after their request was denied.

“Three hours later, the woman was attacked, strangled and left for dead by unknown men, who, in the process, kidnapped the child. Cases of attempted murder and kidnapping were opened and investigations commenced. Information on the whereabouts of the woman was received and the police traced and arrested her in Gauteng,” his statement reads.

Members of Giyani Family Violence, Child Protection and Sexual Offences, Tzaneen K9 and Giyani Crime Prevention units conducted a search operation for the kidnapped girl and her decomposing body was found hanging from a rope under a tree.

The provincial police commissioner, Lieutenant-General Thembi Hadebe, has ordered that the other perpetrators be hunted down and brought to book.

“These types of incidents in which the most vulnerable members of our society are attacked and brutally killed, deserve condemnation by everyone and we therefore call on those with information to assist the police in their investigation,” Hadebe adds.

Mojapelo says the motive for the incident is unknown and that anyone with information can contact Captain Nhlazine Ngomani on 082 319 9889, the Crime Stop number on 08600 10111 or their nearest police station.