Daily Sun (May 30) - THE sad villagers went from house to house and collected R20 to help the grieving mother find her missing daughter. But then the badly mutilated, decomposing body of the mentally ill teenager was found. AND THE MOTHER HAS BEEN ARRESTED FOR THE MURDER OF HER OWN CHILD.

The body of the 15-year-old girl was found in the bushes by men hunting rabbits. Her head had been hacked off, apparently for muthi, and her skull was found some metres away. The mother's friend (34) has also been arrested.

A relative of the mother's friend told Daily Sun that soon after the girl went missing a month ago, the villagers helped the family look for her. "The girl's mother and my relative were also there," he said.  He said a week went by and the people decided to collect money so that the mother could go to Zimbabwe to consult a powerful sangoma.

"A few people even applied for passports to go to Zimbabwe," he said. "But then the girl's mother and her friend were arrested." He said he had warned his relative about going around with this older woman, but eventually he didn't say anything because he was worried he would be evicted from her house. "She told me and other neighbours that her life would change and that she would soon build a big house," he said. When the woman was arrested, her grandchildren were left to stay with neighbours. A police spokesman for Mokopane police confirmed the two women were arrested and charged with murder and are appearing in court today.

) Sangoma Mandla Mqwazi from Fochville says the girl could have been killed for her brains, as her skull looked clean. "Often when muthi killers take the brain they need it for the liquor business, believing the brain of a person under 16 will attract customers."

) It is Child Protection Week, and Daily Sun chose to publish the photo of the girl's body to draw attention to the suffering of too many of SunLand's children at the hands of adults.

See the Daily Sun mobi site for more on this and other stories....

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