Mom of slain ANC councillor says party didn’t deliver
Durban — The mother of slain ANC ward 103 councillor Minenhle Mkhize says the ANC has never contacted her about finishing the house Mkhize was building before he was shot and killed by Mxolisi Gcabashe from KwaNyuswa last year.
Mkhize was gunned down in his home at Cliffdale.
On the day the Durban High Court sentenced Gcabashe for killing Mkhize in August, the deputy secretary of the eThekwini region, Nkosenhle Madlala, said there were “slight glitches” with finishing up the project that Mkhize started but they would live up to the commitment they had made.
“The ANC had promised to take care of Minenhle’s family, especially to finalise the project he had started of building his mother a house,” said Madlala.
Mkhize’s mother, Gugulethu Ndlovu, told the Daily News on Tuesday that the ANC only spoke about this with the media but there had not been any communication between them and her family even after the sentencing.
Madlala and other ANC councillors were in court on that day for the trial of former mayor Zandile Gumede when the news of the sentencing of Gcabashe broke.
Ndlovu said the person who really cared about this was former Public Works and Human Settlements MEC Jomo Sibiya.
“When I heard he was no longer the MEC, I was concerned about what was going to happen with the finishing up of the house,” she said.
Ndlovu said although Gcabashe was sentenced, she hasn’t healed because she still does not know why her son was murdered so brutally.
Gcabashe shot Mkhize in a hail of 15 bullets and Ndlovu had to “collect the brains” of her son the next day. Ndlovu said she was still traumatised.
“I wish that before the hit men agree to kill someone they do a background check on him and see the damage they would cause if they kill that person, then maybe they wouldn’t.”
She said she thought that after the sentencing she was going to get closure and some sort of healing, but that had not happened.
“I knew my son to be a good and caring person. If there is someone who disagrees with this, they must please come forward and I will apologise for my son,” she said.
She made it clear she was happy that Gcabashe was caught and sentenced but said she wished for the masterminds behind the killing of her son to be arrested.
“I believe it was not just one person who orchestrated the whole thing. There were a lot of people involved.”
Ndlovu said the community had been supportive and constantly worried about her safety. She said she was now raising some of her grandchildren and they are living in one room as the older house is not fit for habitation.
She sells veggies from her garden, however, she said after Mkhize was killed, she decided to fell the avocado tree.
“I felt like it was used by the perpetrator to hide when he came to kill my son. I used to make a lot of money by selling avocados but I just had to let the tree go,” she said.
The spokesperson of the eThekwini region in the ANC, Mlondi Mkhize, said there were delays, however, the project would continue.
“There was a breakdown of communication between us in the ANC and our structures. I can promise you that by December 15 the house will be done,” he said.
Mlondi said there are other similar projects they are doing and they have found a person who would be doing Mkhize’s home.
Gcabashe was sentenced to life imprisonment for murder, 12 years for unlawful possession of a semiautomatic firearm and two years for unlawful possession of ammunition.
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