2008/11/26
TWO Dimbaza boys who went missing more than a week ago, sending police on a massive search operation with helicopters, were found happily swimming at East London’s Eastern Beach yesterday morning.
According to King William’s Town police spokesperson Captain Thozama Solani the boys, Bongani Moya, 12, and Olwethu Williams, 11, had walked from Phola Park in Dimbaza to East London on Saturday, November 15 without telling their parents.
“After we heard that the boys were seen in East London last week on Saturday, one of the lifeguards at Eastern Beach called us this morning (yesterday ) saying the two were swimming at the beach,” Solani said.
She said for the past week the boys had been staying with older men who work as car guards around the beachfront .
“They said they were walking with a dog hunting when they met two men in Berlin who were also hunting and joined them. They walked with them until they realised they were near East London and decided to go and play at the jungle gyms at the beach,” said Solani.
She said the parents of the children were lucky their children were not found dead.
“It is a joy to find them because missing children are often not found and in other cases are found dead,” she said.
Olwethu’s mother, Noluthando Williams, said they were relieved their son was back at home.
“We were beginning to lose hope because it’s been a long time since they left and only God knows what could have happened to them,” she said.
She said her son had gone to East London before with his friend whose mother lives in the city. “It was not the first time they had gone to East London alone. They went to visit his friend’s mother before but they came back after she told them to leave,” said Williams.
Solani said there were no visible signs to show the boys had been hurt but they would be taken to a social worker for further evaluation.
Bongani’s aunt, Nombulelo Moya, said the two boys had no particular reason for going to East London because they did not go there to visit her sister.
“I think they were just being disobedient,” she said. - By GCINA NTSALUBA
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