The search for 38-year-old Elizabeth “Tsontso” Moselakgomo ended in heartbreak this week after her family identified her body at the Germiston mortuary.
Moselakgomo disappeared on 9 September after leaving her Rhodesfield, Kempton Park home for an afternoon run. Her eight-year-old daughter was among those who raised the alarm when she did not return home. Days later, her family was forced to confront the news they had feared most.
For those who knew her, Tsontso was more than a name in a missing-persons appeal. Her family described her as someone who held the family together. She was a mother, a churchgoer, a professional and an enthusiastic runner who regularly took to the roads around her community.
Her death has also intensified concerns about the safety of women in and around Kempton Park.
Moselakgomo was one of several women whose bodies have been discovered in the broader Kempton Park and Olifantsfontein area since July. Police have established a multidisciplinary task team to investigate the cases, examine forensic evidence and determine whether there are links between them. At this stage, SAPS has not confirmed that the deaths are connected.
The discovery of another woman’s body in Olifantsfontein on 14 September has only deepened the fear in the community. Women in the area have spoken publicly about feeling unsafe, while running clubs and community members have organised memorial runs and demonstrations in Moselakgomo’s honour.
What makes Tsontso’s story particularly painful is how ordinary the moment was when she left home. She went for a run — something she loved and had done many times before — expecting to return to her daughter and her family.
Instead, a family is now left grieving.
Her death has once again placed South Africa’s gender-based violence crisis under the spotlight. The country has spent years confronting violence against women and children, with government and civil society continuing to push for stronger prevention, protection and accountability. The National Council on Gender-Based Violence and Femicide was established as part of those efforts, while the country continues to grapple with the scale of the crisis.
For Moselakgomo’s family, however, this is not a statistic or a national debate. It is the loss of a daughter, a mother, a relative and a friend.
It is the empty space left behind by someone who was expected to come home.
And as South Africa mourns Elizabeth “Tsontso” Moselakgomo, the question remains painfully simple: How many more women must families lose before women can move through their own communities without fear?
Main Image: IOL
