PORT DICKSON: “I’m so sorry...please forgive me, sayang. Ibu didn’t do it on purpose.”
The haunting cries by Hasmah Masroh, 32, at the Port Dickson Hospital mortuary, drew many to tears, as she was consoled by more than 30 relatives and friends.
Hasnah accidentally left her daughter, Nur Awfa Humaisha Muhammad Ali Riduan, in the back seat of her car as she went to work at a college in Batu 3 here, today.
The two-year-old girl died of a heat stroke.
Hasnah only realised that she had her left Nur Awfa four hours later. By that time, the girl was unconscious. She was later confirmed dead when she was brought to the hospital.
“Ibu is so sorry, sayang, ibu really forgot. Last night, you were fine, Awfa. Today, you’ve left me,” she said.
Hasmah had told her friend that before the incident, she had placed her daughter - who was asleep when they left their home in Taman Hartamas, Sunggala - in the car seat at the back of her Proton Saga.
She said, as soon as she arrived at the college, she made her way to her office without realising that her daughter was in the car.
Meanwhile, one of Hasmah’s friends, who declined to be named, said Hasmah’s routine was to drop off her eldest child at a kindergarten in Port Dickson before sending Awfa to a babysitter in Kampung Paya, before going to work.
“It was a fluke accident. She forgot she brought her daughter to college. She had dropped off her eldest child at the kindergarten but somehow didn’t send her daughter to the babysitter,” said her friend.
“She may have been stressed with work. They also had a visit from the Examinations Board yesterday, which may have been on her mind,” she added.
Meanwhile, Awfa’s father, Muhammad Ali Riduan, in his 30s, said he was told of the incident at 1.30pm.
“This is fated. Allah loved my daughter more,” he said in between sobs.
Meanwhile, Port Dickson district police chief Superintendent Zainudin Ahmad said the girl was left in the car with the doors and windows shut from 9am to 1pm.
“She only realised that she had left her daughter in the car at 1pm. She rushed to the car but found the girl already unconscious.
“She rushed her daughter to the Klinik Kesihatan Port Dickson but the girl was confirmed dead. The case was then referred to the Port Dickson Hospital,” he said.
The case is being investigated under Section 31(1)(a) of the Child Act 2001.
Awfa was laid to rest at the Telok Kemang cemetery after Maghrib prayers.