‘I’ll vote for my dead wife’
SLAIN COUNCILLOR’S HUSBAND STILL BACKS ANC LEADERS SLAM COPS FOR FAILING TO STOP POLITICAL KILLINGS
WHEN Siphosakhe Zulu makes his mark in next month’s local government elections he will vote for his slain wife, who was an ANC ward councillor candidate.
Thembi Elizabeth Mbongo, 35, a ward 6 candidate in Madadeni near Newcastle, was shot dead while preparing dinner for her family in Lister section on July 3.
She is one of at least 12 ANC ward candidates and party members in KwaZulu-Natal who have been killed in the run-up to next week’s local government elections.
Zulu told Sowetan that two men walked into their home that evening. One of them asked to see Mbongo, who was preparing dinner in the kitchen of their RDP home.
Zulu said he did not suspect anything as Mbongo was a community activist who met people often.
The second man walked in and fired four shots at Mbongo, hitting her in the forehead, face and twice on the body.
Her horrified four children and two nephews fled the house.
“Make sure mfowethu,” the gunman’s accomplice allegedly urged him on as he fired at Mbongo.
A shot grazed Zulu’s forehead as he wrestled with the gunman.
Another bullet hit the wall behind him before the two men fled. By then, Mbongo had already died on the kitchen floor.
Zulu said he was convinced the killing was politically motivated and connected to the local government elections.
He said Mbongo, who had been the ANC’s deputy branch secretary in 2014, had told him that certain people were not happy with her nomination as ward councillor.
He said matters came to a head on June 16 when about a dozen people picketed outside their home, calling for Mbongo to step down.
“Some were even saying blood will flow if she didn’t step down,” said Zulu.
The ward was held by the IFP from 1996 until the ANC won it in 2011.
Zulu, wearing an ANC T-shirt after conducting a door-to-door campaign on Saturday, said he would vote for the ANC.
According to the Electoral Act, by-elections should be held within 90 days after a municipal ward council seat becomes vacant due to death, expulsion or resignation of a ward councillor.
In this case, voters will still vote for Mbongo and then elect another candidate in the prescribed period after the municipal elections.
Zulu said he will be voting for his wife, whose face still smiles down on passers-by from street lampposts in the dusty settlement.
“We are still voting for the ANC,” said Zulu. He added that they live in fear because the killers have not been arrested. He called on police to “pull up their socks” in their investigation of his wife’s murder.
No arrests have been made.