Cape Town - Dalene Scullard carefully placed a white rose on the lid of her son Jaylin’s coffin.
Carrying a large portrait of the 10-year-old in her arms, she gazed at his white and blue coffin at Muizenberg Cemetery on Thursday.
Residents, pastors and pupils from Alpine Primary in Beacon Valley surrounded the open grave. The school band drummed a slow beat as the coffin was lowered.
Scullard said: “I love you so much. “You are an angel in the sky. No one will take your place in my heart. I will miss you, my boy. I will say see you later; this is not goodbye.”
The heartbroken mom’s voice echoed across the cemetery. A final drumbeat marked the end of the ceremony.
Jaylin was playing outside his home in Beacon Valley, Mitchells Plain, when he was killed in gang crossfire last week.
Logan Koert, 10, shared a class with Jaylin in grades 3 and 4. The Grade 5 pupil said they were friends and often played together.
“I feel sad. We are going to miss him.”
Reeza Michaels, 13, said it was wrong that children were being killed.
“They don’t have a reason for doing it.” He said he did not feel safe walking to school.
A Grade 6 school pupil said she wished the shooting would stop.
“I’m very scared to walk to school. They kill innocent people. They must stop shooting.”
Cynthia Isaacs, a resident of Beacon Valley, said it was always worse when a child was killed.
“We feel heartbroken. It could have been anyone’s child.” Isaacs added that children were often used to work for drug merchants.
“Small children are used to sell drugs these days. When my son was 12 he started selling drugs and then started using it himself.”
Another resident, Felicity Simpson, said people always asked, “Where was the mom?” when a child is killed.
“He was playing in front of his own house. “Where are children supposed to play?”
Cape Argus