Durban - “I would like to apologise for what I have done, I’m really sorry. His father has denied his paternity and I don’t have an ID to apply for a grant - I left it in the rural area. Please can you raise him for me. If not, can you take him to police.”
These words were found scribbled on a piece of paper, discovered alongside a baby boy who was abandoned in a minibus taxi in Durban at the weekend.
Zoh Ngcobo - an enrolled nursing auxiliary at Life Westville Hospital - was among the first at the scene. She had just finished work and was waiting at the taxi rank, between the hospital and The Pavilion shopping centre, when a driver called her over. He had discovered the baby - believed to be just a few days old - tucked away under one of the seats in his taxi.
Ngcobo said it looked as though the baby had been there for some time.
“He was hungry, he was trying to eat his little fingers,” she said, “And his eyes were swollen from crying.”
The police were contacted and the baby rushed to the trauma unit at the hospital. After he was fed and cleaned, Ngcobo said, the baby started to settle a bit. He was taken to Addington Hospital for further care.
Police spokeswoman Captain Nqobile Gwala said Westville police were investigating a case of child neglect. “A baby boy, about 2 days old, was found by the taxi driver under the passenger seat,” Gwala said. “Circumstances surrounding the incident are being investigated.”
Meanwhile on Friday, IPSS Medical Rescue’s Paul Herbst said paramedics received reports that a Pretoria mother had left her 4-year-old son in a hot car while shopping at Tiffany’s shopping centre.
“A concerned citizen noticed the boy in the vehicle and communicated to him through a small gap left open in the car window,” Herbst said. “They waited with the child for 10 minutes in the hope that the mother would return, before phoning emergency services.” Shortly before emergency services arrived, the mother returned to the car.
“We appeal to members of the public, not to leave young children or animals, unaccompanied in hot vehicles,” Herbst said.
“This is not an acceptable practice and emergency services will force entry into such vehicles.”
Prosecution could follow.