Father reaches out to McCanns after reuniting with daughter

Father reaches out to McCanns after reuniting with daughter
2015-03-11 14:01




An age progression computer generated image of missing child, Madeleine McCann. (Metropolitan Police/Teri Blythe/ AP)



Johannesburg – A father who was reunited with his kidnapped daughter after 17 years said on Tuesday that he would like to talk to Madeleine McCann's parents.

He said he had never given up hope that his daughter was alive, and researched the case of the British girl who disappeared in Portugal in 2007, days before her fourth birthday.

"I'm trying to get a hold of the mother," the father said, during a press conference shown on SABC. "What we wanted to tell them is that, never give up."

The girl's biological mother said: "All they have to do is just believe and pray and have hope."




The couple found their daughter last month, after their second daughter befriended a girl at school who looked remarkably like her. That friend turned out to be her big sister who was kidnapped in 1997. The girl, not named because she is a minor, was taken from her mother's bedside in a Cape Town hospital at just 3-days-old.

The couple kept their daughter's memory alive, celebrating her birthday every year. Their three younger children blew out the candles on the birthday cake of a sister they had never met.

Police officer Mike Barkhuizen also refused to let the case go. He told Netwerk24 that he had been looking for the girl for the past five years, and knew the moment's he saw the teenager, that she was the baby kidnapped all those years ago.

In 2013, British police reopened an investigation into the girl's disappearance, believing that she was still alive, after they discovered new leads.

In the years following the South African kidnapping, the parents were tormented by stories of children found murdered or trafficked to foreign countries.

"That killed us," her father said, but they said they always felt their first child was alive.

Their marriage, however, took strain and the couple is now separated



http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/Father-reaches-out-to-McCanns-after-reuniting-with-daughter-20150311

I read this story last week but I can´t see that it is anything at all like the McCann saga. My personal feeling is that the South African man is looking for publicity and money.

mara thon wrote:I read this story last week but I can´t see that it is anything at all like the McCann saga.  My personal feeling is that the South African man is looking for publicity and money.

Could be, but whereas a couple of years ago the McCanns would have been onto this story in double quick time, this father is having trouble getting in touch with them. Things appear to have changed.

I don't see any similarity with Madeleine's case as the South African child actually was kidnapped. I am glad the parents were reunited with their daughter after all this time. I notice the mother advises the McCanns, "All they have to do is just believe and pray and have hope." I do believe in prayer but think that if the McCanns do pray their prayers are for themselves and their "hope" would be that they are never held legally responsible for their role in Madeleine's "disappearance".

AnnaEsse wrote:

mara thon wrote:I read this story last week but I can´t see that it is anything at all like the McCann saga.  My personal feeling is that the South African man is looking for publicity and money.

Could be, but whereas a couple of years ago the McCanns would have been onto this story in double quick time, this father is having trouble getting in touch with them.  Things appear to have changed.

I can´t really imagine the McCanns dashing off to a South African township for a meeting Anna, they only like to be with the rich and famous.

mara thon wrote:

AnnaEsse wrote:

mara thon wrote:I read this story last week but I can´t see that it is anything at all like the McCann saga.  My personal feeling is that the South African man is looking for publicity and money.

Could be, but whereas a couple of years ago the McCanns would have been onto this story in double quick time, this father is having trouble getting in touch with them.  Things appear to have changed.

I can´t really imagine the McCanns dashing off to a South African township for a meeting Anna, they only like to be with the rich and famous.

I can't imagine them doing that either, mara thon, but there is nothing in any newspaper this time that it gives them renewed hope. I'm sure that previously the news media would have been in line to get a quote from the McCanns about how this story gives them hope and that they would never give up the search for Madeleine, but there's nothing.

These parents were only re-united with their daughter by pure chance. Had either family moved away from the area, it is extremely unlikely that the sisters would have gone to the same school and become friends.
In that respect it is very different from the McCann case, where there is no chance of such an encounter.