This story goes back to 1973. Unfortunately it is not a very nice story and therefore, all the more, it should be told. The story is rooted in Namibia but then it was South West Africa. In 1973 I jumped the broomstick and inherited 3 step children. And we lived in a rented house and life was treating us good.
The town where we resided had the usual alcohol abuse problems. Bars were packed from dusk to midnight and the money just kept rolling in.
Betty had a booze problem and visited the bar regularly but since she had a 2 year old daughter and friends and neighbours were tired of looking after the child while mother was gallivanting from bar to bar and hooking.
On this particular night Betty wanted to do her bar rounds and with nobody to look after baby Joan she, out of desperation, took the child with her and being inconvenienced with the child, Baby Joan was hidden under the bar stool wrapped up in a blanket. And the night progressed and all were getting more and more under the influence. Betty was so drunk she could hardly stand.
She was taken home, or elsewhere, more delicious. Nobody seemed to notice that Baby Joan was missing nor did they care. Round about midnight the barman while, doing his locking-up rounds, discovered the baby under the stool and blissfully asleep. The poor guy did not know whose child it was so the police was called in who in turn called out the children’s welfare officer, in the middle of the night. About 5 days later I returned home from work to find the baby laying on my bed. The Wellfare had asked my wife if it would be ok if the baby stayed by us indefinitely or until the court ruled that the baby be placed in a secure environment. At the time my wife was pregnant.
The baby stayed with us for several months and eventually the Welfare officer came to collect Deborah as we renamed her. We missed her as if she was our own. Deborah was place in to the care of a husband and wife who was infertile. They lived on a farm in the eastern sector of South West Africa and the war was raging around them. My twins were born in 1974. Late in the 1970’s we heard, via the radio that a farm had been attacked in Eastern SWA and a child murdered. The parents had left the child at home in the care of the domestic in order to do their business at the nearest town. The child had been decapitated and the head placed on a stake at the entrance gate. Something in my wife and myself died too.
Disclaimer: All articles and letters published on MyNews24 have been independently written by members of News24's community. The views of users published on News24 are therefore their own and do not necessarily represent the views of News24. News24 editors also reserve the right to edit or delete any and all comments received.
