'She is using my son as a zombie'
August 03 2010 at 10:38AM

By Mpumi Kiva

A grieving mom got a creepy visit from her dead son when his body mysteriously arrived on a local orphanage's stoep.

Little Simamkele Maphini's decomposing body was found in the tiny white coffin he was buried in nearly three months ago after he died of meningitis.

Now the orphanage owner has been taken in for questioning after Simamkele's mother and the community accused her of turning the boy into a zombie.

The Du Noon house in Benelle Street was a hive of activity early Monday morning when a neighbour saw the coffin and went to alert orphanage owner Tozi Gonya.

Tozi is a well-known face in the area because she looks after abandoned and abused kids.

When the boy's mom Fundiswa Maphini arrived at the scene, she confirmed that the tiny corpse was her dead four-year-old son and told the Daily Voice she knows Tozi well.

Fundiswa said Tozi had approached her a day before her son died in April, offering to look after the cute little boy.

"I refused her offer and a day later my boy wouldn't wake up," she said.

"His body felt numb and he died later that day."

Fundiswa said her suspicions that Tozi was practising witchcraft were confirmed when the orphans told her the 54-year-old woman was keeping Simamkele in a cupboard.

"The kids came to tell me they saw my child crying in the house," she said.

"They told me she was feeding him (sugar water) because she couldn't afford the Coke he used to drink with me."

Out of desperation, Fundiswa consulted a sangoma who told her Simamkele would be returning home on August 2.

"That is not my real son I buried but a second body. She is using my son as a zombie," she claimed.

On Monday, even cops were too scared to open the dirty white coffin and forensic officials had the grim task of lifting the lid and peering inside.

A terrified Tozi tells the Daily Voice Fundiswa is nothing but a grieving mother desperate to blame her.

"She believes that I killed her baby. All I know is her baby died of meningitis," she said.

"She accused me of witchcraft and of keeping her baby as my zombie.

"She must have hired people to dig the coffin and dump it in my yard."

Milnerton police spokeswoman Daphne Dell said the boy's coffin and body were dug up from Maitland Cemetery. - Daily Voice