“I’;M coming now.” These were the last words Pekakarua Sylvia Kaimu said to her daughter Cheryl Avihe Ujaha shortly before the little girl vanished eight weeks ago.
It was on a Sunday. Two days later, nine-year-old Avihe’;s mutilated body was found discarded near a riverbed between Katutura and Khomasdal. She had been raped and partially dismembered, and had to be buried without a foot, both arms and a thigh.
The horrendous nature of the murder left Namibians reeling with shock.
People from all walks of life – including former president Hifikepunye Pohamba, first lady Monica Geingos and prime minister Saara Kuugongelwa-Amadhila – attended Avihe’;s funeral at Windhoek’;s Pionierspark cemetery.
For the first time since her daughter’;s death, her mother – who had previously avoided talking to the media – sat down with The Namibian on Sunday to talk about Avihe’;s final hours.
Kaimu agreed to have the interview in her bedroom at her home in Herero Location, near the Herero Mall, in Katutura.
Several things stood out as we entered the room, including Avihe’;s photo on the dressing table, and two suitcases of clothes that belonged to the murdered child.
“I don’;t have appetite. I am trying to eat something. I hope you don’;t mind,” Kaimu said before grabbing a mince sandwich as she sat down near the window.
Her eyes were swollen, as if she had been crying. She said Avihe’;s death will haunt her forever.
“She is always in my mind. I still see her face. It’;s just like it happened yesterday. I don’;t want to think about her brutal death, and how she was found. I want to think about happy memories. What is strange, though, is how I feel she will come back; that she is not gone yet,” she said while fighting back tears.
“I don’;t ask questions like: Why me, God? If not me, then who? I would not wish this pain, devastation and heartbreak on anyone,” she added.
Avihe was her youngest child, and she felt an overwhelming sense of protective love towards her, Kaimu said.
“I don’;t know if God was warning me. I was overprotective of her. Avihe was chubby, and because of her body, I feared for her, and so I would look for her every hour when she went out to play. She also knew that she must come back home now and then to report in,” narrated Kaimu.
As her eyes welled up, Kaimu said after searching high and low for Avihe when she had not returned home by sunset, she knew something was wrong.
“My precious, beautiful Avihe is gone, and I never even got to hold her one more time, or say goodbye. How can someone kill a child in such a horrible manner?” she asked sobbingly.
She paused for a minute, caught her breath, and dried her tears before continuing.
“One of the things which keep me sane is remembering the person she was. She was confident, smart, extremely opinionated and strong-willed.”
The mother recalled how she had bought Avihe a hamburger on Saturday evening. “She enjoyed it very much. We slept on one bed. That evening, she told me she wanted to go to her father in the United Kingdom.”
Kaimu said they always slept in on Sunday mornings, but that day, Avihe had gone to friends a bit early.
“I told her she should have breakfast first, but she left anyway. She was still wearing her pyjamas, so after an hour or so, I called her to come and change. She came home so happy. I was busy cooking and doing laundry, and I told her to go and take a bath”.
Kaimu cooks and sells food, and that Sunday, she had orders to deliver to customers.
“I left the house between 11h00 and 12h00. Avihe was busy dressing,” she said, adding that she had put on her favourite jumpsuit.
“My last words to her were ‘;I’;m coming now’;,” she recalled.
“I wish I had told her not to leave the house, or even that I love her very much. My last memory of her was Avihe standing in front of the mirror, and applying lotion. Life is empty without her.
A neighbour told The Namibian that Avihe was later seen looking for a friend at a house in the neighbourhood.
“They were very close because they had been friends since they were four years old. Avihe came again after 13h00 to look for her friend, but she was visiting her aunt. I, for a brief moment, saw Avihe playing with my other child, but how and when she left, I did not see,” the neighbour said.
Kaimu said she had returned home at 15h00, but found no one there.
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