The disappearance of Joshlin Smith: A case that raises more questions than answers

The Joshlin Smith story keeps sparking new conversations.

In the family’s makeshift two rooms, societal problems are amplified and peeled away, layer by layer.

At the centre of it all, a missing child, the chokehold that poverty has on families, the slow deaths that drug dependence brings to families, the demonising narrative that behind every missing child is a traditional healer’s muti concoction.

If Kelly Smith did indeed say her missing child has made her famous, she knew that the missing person’s case had a message to deliver and, as a result, conversations are being had.

One of those conversations is about the adoption processes in South Africa, legal and illegal.

ALSO READ: Joshlin Smith case: Social worker reveals Kelly’s drug use and child abuse

This week, we heard that a loving family had attempted to take the child in and formally adopt her to give her a better quality of life than Kelly provided.

At the last minute, Joshlin’s biological parents decided not to put her in a place of safety.

They would not give her the opportunity to live a better life.

The rest is history and the country is still searching for the child, with little to no information to go on.

While rumours continue that the child may have been sold, either to an adoptive family or to child traffickers who may have taken her out of the country, the child’s mother keeps mum on what she may or may not know.

ALSO READ: Joshlin Smith case: Social worker says mother refused shelter, chose trip instead

Assuming one of these two rumours is true, it then starts another conversation.

If trafficking and illegal adoptions happen so easily, how did the government’s social workers miss seeing the desperate needs of this child?

Growing up, we knew social workers to be the voice of children in distress.

We knew that seeing a social worker at a specific house meant a rescued was needed.

Have they become powerless, are they disinterested?

Is there a skills shortage, or do the rights of parents to keep and decide for their children supersede these children’s inherent right to a sound quality of life in a safe and loving environment?

ALSO READ: Mother accused of selling her toddler gives birth to another baby behind bars, denied bail

Social workers are the first line respondents when parents claim alienation, but when children are in an unsafe, harmful, two-parent home, their absence and stamp of authority is clearly evident.

Who speaks for children like Joshlin before they become statistics?

Once again we are found wanting in our responses to a situation that should have been averted.