A baby boy believed to have been abducted in Somerset West last week is still missing, and his parents are pleading with the public to assist them in their desperate search.
“If you can assist by sharing information that can aid the investigation, please help,” said Asanda Yeko, distraught mother of six-month-old Ivakele Imvano Yeko. “He means everything to us and we just want him back home safely.
The baby boy was apparently abducted in Somerset West last Monday (5 December).
DistrictMail and Helderberg Gazette previously reported on the incident which occurred around lunchtime, but was reported to Somerset West police only around 22:00 (“Six-month-old infant ‘abducted’ in Somerset West CBD,” News24, Tuesday 6 December).
Sergeant Suzan Jantjies, spokesperson for Somerset West police, said little Ivakele was taken around 13:00 on Monday.
This after his 22-year-old mother entrusted an aunt, a fellow community member and mother herself, with the care of her child before leaving for work on Monday morning. When she returned home she was informed her child had been taken.
At her Nomzamo home, Yeko said a relative, who had heard from others of her son’s disappearance and the child minder’s failure to report the incident to police immediately, relayed the news. “Asanda was shocked, started crying hysterically and was totally lost, if only for a moment,” another relative accompanying the distraught mother related.
Yeko recalled how she had dropped Ivakele off at the aunt’s house shortly after 06:00 that day. She had cared for the baby since Friday 25 November, when Asanda started a new job as a general worker at a wine estate in Somerset West.
According to Yeko, the child minder, her husband, their seven-year-old daughter and Ivakele travelled to Somerset West CBD to attend to (social services agency) Sassa-related matters.
She stopped at a liquor store in Victoria Street and asked an unknown woman to hold the baby and watch over her child. After coming out of the store, both the woman and children were missing.
The incident was later reported to local police and a case of abduction was being investigated by the police’s Family Violence, Child Protection and Sexual Offences (FCS) Unit. Police obtained security footage showing the suspected abductor getting into a taxi with the children and making off.
The older child was apparently dropped off close to her home and safely returned. However, the baby still had not been found.
Authorities are searching for what is believed to be a foreign national woman with braids speaking isiZulu.
The infant, with short black hair and brown eyes, was last seen wearing a red T-shirt, nappy and a dummy hanging around his neck.
Anyone with information that could aid the investigation and search was urged to contact Captain Trevor Nash of FCS on 082 301 8910.
Yeko, with Ivakele’s father Phumlani Tolibadi (25) seated next to her, said what they are going through is “indescribable”.
“Something is missing and we feel incomplete,” she said. “It is killing us, we are walking zombies.”
Ivakele’s grandmother, Elsie Tolibadi (48), expressed not being able to sleep or eat and being on high alert all the time as exhausting.
“We jump at every sound. If a car passes outside we react to see whether it’s someone bringing our sweet boy back to us,” she elaborated.
According to Tolibadi, Ivakele was the joy and pure delight that awaited her on returning home from work every day. “He is already such a loving, kind and joyful boy. We miss him sorely.”
