A Woman ask Where is my dead husband’s head?” That’s the question Thembisile Ngoba would like to ask former Blue Bulls player Phindile Joseph Ntshongwana, who was on Friday convicted of murder and rape.
Ngoba, from Ngonyameni, was married to Scelo Mkhize who was hacked to death by Ntshongwana during his bloody Durban murder spree in 2011. Ntshongwana axed four men to death and raped a woman.
While Mkhize’s decomposed body was recovered three days later, his head has not been found. Now his wife wants answers.
“I won’t ask him for an apology or why he did it. I just want to know where is my husband’s head?” she said on Friday outside Durban High Court, where the former rugby player was found guilty on all nine charges.
Speaking for the first time since the brutal attack, Ngoba said: “How can I move on with my life when I still don’t know where my husband’s head is?” Holding back tears, she said knowing would finally put an end to her “sleepless nights”.
Her three children, a 13-year-old boy and 5-year-old twins, had been robbed of their father and the family’s breadwinner. The twins, a boy and a girl, were a year old when their father was murdered.
Thembisile Ngoba, the wife of one of the victims killed by Joseph Ntshongwana, outside Durban High Court. Picture: Gcina Ndwalane
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“The other day, while watching court proceedings on TV, my little ones asked me if this was the man that killed their father. I was so heartbroken. I didn’t know what to say and ended up weeping.”
Ngoba said Mkhize, a security guard at Mobeni Heights, had left for work on a Tuesday evening. He was waiting for a taxi when Ntshongwana attacked him. When the family couldn’t reach him on his phone, they raised the alarm.
“We went to his workplace, but they said he hadn’t reported for work,” said Ngoba. The police phoned her three days later.
Welcoming the judgment, Ngoba said she hoped that Ntshongwana would get life in prison. “It’s the only thing he deserves,” she said.
Sentencing proceedings will start on Wednesday.
Acting Judge Irfaan Khalil said on Friday that Ntshongwana knew it was wrong when he killed his victims with an axe. “The accused had the necessary criminal capacity when committing the offences.”
He found Ntshongwana guilty of four counts of murder, two of attempted murder, one of assault with intent to commit grievous bodily harm, one of kidnapping and one of rape.
Ntshongwana killed Thembelenkosini Cebekhulu in Montclair on March 20, 2011; Paulos Hlongwa two days later; Simon Ngidi the following day and Mkhize sometime that week.
All were hacked to death with an axe. Two of the victims were beheaded.
He raped and kidnapped a woman. He tried to kill two men, one in Umlazi on March 21, 2011, and the other in Lamontville on March 23.
Ntshongwana assaulted a man in Yellowwood Park in November 2010, four days before he kidnapped and held a woman hostage at his home – also in Yellowwood Park.
Acting Judge Khalil said the contention by Ntshongwana’s advocate, Themba Mjoli, that at the time of the crimes his client suffered from a mental illness and had no control over his actions, did not hold water.
He said the fact that Ntshongwana put the axe in a plastic bag in his car before driving off to find the next victim showed he knew what he was going to do.
“The murders were planned and not impulsive acts. His decapitation of the victims was purposeful,” said the judge.
He said kidnapping the rape victim and holding her hostage for three days at his home “could hardly be said to be the actions of a person acting in automatism”.
Ntshongwana’s attempts to conceal the axe in a kennel and wash blood from his bathroom indicated he knew what he was doing.
Referring to an attack in Umbilo where a witness shouted at Ntshongwana to stop, Acting Judge Khalil said the fact that he stopped and fled indicated that he knew what he was doing was wrong.
He praised the efforts of the police task team, led by Lieutenant-Colonel Jason McGray, that led to Ntshongwana’s arrest.
Ntshongwana showed no emotion as the verdict was read !!
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