Ubuntu is dead. Strangers and fear are alive. This is my answer to Andrew Molefe's daughter, Amogelang (April 5, In search of ubuntu to answer my daughter).

Ubuntu is dead. Strangers and fear are alive. This is my answer to Andrew Molefe's daughter, Amogelang (April 5, In search of ubuntu to answer my daughter).

Call me a pessimist, but where was ubuntu when Thato Radebe and the Mbhele sisters needed it most? Where was ubuntu when Amogelang was crying for it? Every day the media has grim stories of its demise.

Killed for a cellphone, maimed for a car, orphaned for a necklace is part of our daily lives. Our homes and churches are no longer our sanctuaries. Fear and brutality has taken over.

Those who are our brothers in the day become our tormentors at night. There is no humanness or brotherhood.

Martin Luther King Jr said: "The true neighbour will risk his position, his prestige and even his life for the welfare of others."

Where is the neighbour whose guiding philosophy is: "Every child is mine and I will protect him/her." Where was this neighbour when Amogelang was humiliated? Instead of love, she found suspicion.

We are to blame for the death of ubuntu, that crime killed. Crime is a symptom of our ubuntu-less society.

This happens when people stop caring about others, when we give bad service at hospitals, police stations, shops, taxis, home affairs and so on. Creating a spirit of universal responsibility is our collective duty.

Lucas Ntyintyane, by e-mail