The guilty verdict in the case of Joshlin Smith might have brought a measure of justice, but it has not brought peace.
Racquel “Kelly” Smith and her accomplices were found guilty on Friday, but the public is still left with many questions, the most pertinent being what truly happened to six-year-old Joshlin and where is she now?
Judge Nathan Erasmus said Joshlin had been “exchanged” and “sold like a commodity”, her freedom taken from her in an act tantamount to modern-day slavery.
The court proceedings, held in the heart of the very community which searched so tirelessly for her, helped affirm that Joshlin’s disappearance had affected the entire community and SA at large.
But even as Smith faces the real possibility of life in prison, she remains silent.
Her silence is cruel and absolutely shocking coming from a mother who is meant to protect her children.
Amid the testimony of drug-fuelled deals and R20,000 price tags, of whispered exchanges with sangomas and negotiations like livestock trading, Joshlin’s humanity, her childhood has been eclipsed.
Smith has taken her daughter’s freedom and she has denied her family the truth.
Her mother, Amanda Daniels Smith, told our sister publication Sunday Times that she just wanted her grandchild back.
“The sentence doesn’t matter to me. What matters is that Joshlin is not with us,” she said.
We agree.
The justice system has spoken, but only Smith holds the power to unlock the truth, and unless she does so — or if there’s a major breakthrough in the investigation — we will never know what truly happened.
She has the opportunity to do one final right thing.
Until then, there can be no closure.
As a nation, we are left with another urgent lesson which is that we must do better to protect our children, sometimes even from their parents.
Too many children in SA still fall through the cracks and are exploited in silence, but nothing gets done.
Smith told others around her, before Joshlin’s disappearance, that there would be a big event in Saldanha “like a movie”, but no-one paid attention to it.
We commend the people of Saldanha Bay, the mothers who prayed outside court, the officers who searched ships and shorelines and the prosecutors who made the case for not giving up.
Our hope is that one day we will finally know what happened to Joshlin, but we hope that by then it will not be too late to save her.
The Herald
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