Ramaphosa orders priority probe as Kempton Park body count reaches seven

Seven women have been found dead in and around Kempton Park, north-east of Johannesburg, since mid-July, the most recent body discovered on Tuesday morning. President Cyril Ramaphosa has directed that the cases be prioritised and said no stone would be left unturned in finding those responsible.

The deaths stretch across two months and two police stations, and it was a review of old dockets that brought the seventh case into the investigation. Gauteng’s acting police commissioner, Maj-Gen Fred Kekana, said officers went back through station records after noticing that bodies were being picked up.

“After noticing that there are bodies being picked up, we went back to our police stations, and unfortunately it came to light that a body of a female in her late 20s was observed in a river next to a mall,” Kekana said at a briefing. That woman was found on 7 September in a town near Kempton Park.

Most of the seven were found either partially or fully naked. Only two have been identified.

What police have said, and what they have not

Police say they are not linking the deaths to a serial killer at this stage. They are investigating the possibility that a group of people is behind the killings, and whether some of the deaths are copycat crimes.

“It could be that it’s a copycat crime that is happening right here but so far, no linkages as yet,” police spokesperson Brig Athlenda Mathe said.

One arrest has been made, in connection with the discovery of the first body. That person remains in police custody. Police have not said the cases are linked, and that absence is itself part of the record.

The first body was found in mid-July. The second was found in late August. The rest were discovered this month, two of them in the last two days.

Elizabeth Moselakgomo

One of the two women identified is Elizabeth Moselakgomo, a 38-year-old runner. She went missing during a routine jog last Wednesday, and it was her young daughter who raised the alarm when she did not return. Her body was found on Saturday, three days after she disappeared, and relatives identified her on Monday.

Her disappearance had prompted a public search. Her death has since become the name most South Africans attach to a set of cases that had, until this week, been reported piece by piece.

The instruction from the presidency

Ramaphosa said the killings were causing fear and uncertainty in communities, and especially among women.

“Our law enforcement agencies are working urgently to establish the facts, keep communities safe and bring the perpetrator or perpetrators to justice,” he said.

He said he had directed that the cases be prioritised. The South African Police Service has urged women in the Kempton Park area, which sits beside the country’s main international airport, to avoid walking or running alone, particularly in isolated areas.

The Commission for Gender Equality urged residents of Kempton Park to work with the police to find whoever is responsible.

“These deaths are indicative that women in South Africa continue to face environments in which their ordinary freedom of movement can become a matter of life and death,” the commission said. “Women should be able to run, walk to work, use public transport, return home, visit friends and participate in community life without having to calculate whether an ordinary activity could place their lives at risk.”

Why this lands differently here

South Africa treats gender-based violence as a national disaster, a designation made after protests in November last year. The rate at which women are killed in this country is five times the global average, according to UN Women.

That figure is the reason a set of cases in one Ekurhuleni town has travelled as far as it has. It is also the reason the police instruction to women in Kempton Park, to change how and where they move, has drawn criticism. The commission’s statement speaks directly to that tension. A country that has declared gender-based violence a national disaster is being asked what that declaration changes on an ordinary Wednesday evening.

The police response has been substantial. Seven dockets are now being worked together, a provincial acting commissioner has briefed on the record, an arrest has been made and a suspect remains in custody, and the presidency has put its weight behind the investigation. Whether the linkage holds, and whether the person in custody is connected to any of the other six deaths, is what the investigation is now for.

As BBC News Africa reported on 15 September, police have not ruled out the possibility that a group is responsible, and are investigating whether some of the killings copy earlier ones.

What happens next

Police have asked anyone with information about the deaths to come forward, and have said the investigation into all seven cases continues. The person arrested in connection with the first body remains in custody, and no court date has been given for that case.

Source: BBC News Africa, South African president vows justice as more women’s bodies found near Johannesburg