On an October evening in 2015, Dutch medical student Sophia Koetsier told her friends she was going to the latrines at a safari camp in Uganda. Fifteen minutes later, she had vanished without a sound or trace.
A Young Doctor’s African Dream
At 21, Sophia’s future seemed written in medicine. She had traveled from the Netherlands to Kampala for an internship at Lubaga Hospital. In two months, she delivered babies, assisted in surgeries, and built trust with patients by learning their language.
She told her mother she felt at home in Uganda, even imagining a future there. By late October, with her internship complete, Sophia and two other Dutch students decided to celebrate with a safari through Murchison Falls National Park.
They hired guide Michael Kijambu for the journey. For days, they trekked through one of Africa’s wildest reserves, where the Nile cut through valleys of crocodiles, hippos, lions, and elephants. On October 28, they stopped near the Uganda Wildlife Authority’s education center.
That evening, Sophia picked up a half-empty bottle she used for trash and said she was stepping out. A ranger later claimed he saw her by the latrines, gazing at the river. It was the last certain sighting of her.
The First Night of Panic
When Sophia failed to return after fifteen minutes, her friends searched the camp, calling her name. Rangers quickly joined, but the sun had set. The area swarmed with predators that moved silently through the grass, and the Nile ran black and fast.
Sophia’s mother, Marije Slijkerman, had just returned from visiting her daughter. In Kampala, she received the call. Hours later, she was on the first flight north, arriving at the camp the next day alongside Dutch embassy officials to join the search.
The site looked strangely undisturbed. There were no broken branches, no signs of struggle, not even footprints in the dirt. The only object recovered was Sophia’s plastic bottle, found a few meters away from the riverbank.
That evening, an English couple staying nearby added an unsettling detail. They had spoken to Sophia earlier. She was articulate and polite, but the woman thought she seemed vulnerable. They even warned the guide and camp warden to watch her carefully.
A Scene That Looked Arranged
Two days later, the search widened, and rangers stumbled upon a scene that made the official story difficult to believe. Sophia’s clothes were discovered in pieces, cut into strips, and scattered. Her underwear was found tied high in the branches of a tree.
Other belongings, including a purse and sunglasses, lay neatly on the ground. One shoe stood upright as though it had been carefully placed. Everything looked deliberate. There was no mud, no blood, and no signs of animal activity anywhere.
Authorities immediately announced a wild animal attack. Yet Dutch forensic experts later determined the clothes were sliced with sharp edges, not ripped by claws or teeth. The theory of crocodiles or lions never matched the evidence found on the ground.
Marije watched as rangers pulled her daughter’s belongings from bushes and branches. “Some of her things were folded,” she later said. “What kind of animal folds clothes?” It felt staged, as if someone wanted it to appear like an attack.
The DNA That Changed Everything
Instead of treating the site as a crime scene, authorities handled the evidence carelessly. Items were passed between handlers, improperly bagged, and eventually returned to the family. With little faith left, Marije paid for private testing in the Netherlands.
The results were devastating. Multiple items carried DNA from a man unknown to Sophia’s group. The profile did not match the Dutch students, and it did not match Ugandan police officers who had touched the evidence. Someone else had been involved.
Yet Ugandan police never investigated. They closed the case in just three days, insisting Sophia had been dragged off by wildlife. It was a conclusion made quickly, and it would haunt every attempt to seek truth in the years ahead.
An Investigation Left in Ruins
From the start, the investigation unraveled with alarming oversights. A ranger said he had seen Sophia speaking with another officer near the latrines that night. But when asked, the officer denied it outright. No one pressed him further.
The officer was not questioned again. His alibi was never checked. His DNA was never tested. Meanwhile, Ugandan officials leaned on Sophia’s medical history. She had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder at 16, and investigators hinted she may have wandered off alone.
Marije rejected this entirely. Her daughter was not unstable, nor was she self-destructive. Hospital colleagues described Sophia as highly competent and professional. The narrative seemed like a way to dismiss the case rather than search for answers.
Adding to the unease, Marije later discovered that 400 recruits from the Uganda Wildlife Authority were training less than two kilometers from the camp that same night. Yet none of them were ever questioned, and their alibis remain unknown.
A Mother Refuses to Stop
In the years that followed, Marije returned to Uganda again and again. She hired forensic experts, independent labs, and private investigators. She reconstructed her daughter’s last day, gathering witness statements ignored by police and comparing timelines with data from Sophia’s phone.
What she found raised even more suspicions. Sophia’s phone had been manually disabled at 2:18 p.m., only twelve minutes after she was last seen near the viewing platform. Authorities never disclosed that detail, nor did they explain why it was hidden.
Her investigation uncovered irregularities in the tour guide’s license and whispers of organized criminal networks along Uganda’s western borders. With every discovery, the official explanation of a wild animal attack looked less like fact and more like a convenient cover.
Whispers of Trafficking and Cover-Ups
By 2025, two theories dominated. One suggested Sophia had been targeted by human traffickers operating near Uganda’s parks. The other hinted at collusion within local authorities, an inside job disguised as an accident. Neither theory could be confirmed, yet both fit the evidence.
Independent testing later revealed two more unidentified DNA profiles from the area, undisclosed for years by police. Witnesses who might have shed light were overlooked, and records of statements disappeared. The deeper Marije searched, the more silence she met from officials.
Even as evidence mounted, Ugandan police clung to their narrative. Sophia drowned, they said. She was taken by wildlife. It was a story repeated so often that it became the official truth, regardless of the facts uncovered by her mother.
A Fight That Refuses to End
The deeper Marije pushed, the greater the risks became. She received anonymous threats warning her to stop. Cars without plates lingered outside her hotel. Late-night phone calls carried nothing but silence. She understood the message, but she did not stop.
She carried Sophia’s case to the European Parliament and the U.S. State Department. Lawmakers expressed concern but stopped short of action. In 2024, she forced Ugandan courts to release hidden forensic reports confirming two additional DNA profiles had been withheld since 2020.
International pressure built. German newspapers exposed the failures, and Ugandan human rights groups accused police of obstruction. Ugandan officials promised another reinvestigation—their third since 2020. By then, Marije had little reason to believe promises would change the truth.
Through her foundation, Find Sophia, she raised funds to keep the search alive. She published timelines, satellite images, and reports online, hoping that transparency might force accountability. It was costly, dangerous, and exhausting, but she refused to give up.
The Haunting Question
Nearly a decade later, Ugandan authorities still insist Sophia was lost to the river. Yet no remains have ever been found, and the evidence tells another story. Belongings arranged in the bush, clothing cut with precision, and DNA from men never identified.
Marije has traveled 28 times to the ground where her daughter vanished, retracing the same steps with each return. Each trip reveals fragments, overlooked details, or withheld reports. With every finding, the official version seems less believable and the silence more deliberate.
She asks the same question each time: “How can a person disappear in front of so many people and leave nothing but silence behind?”
