Murder suicide shocks community

A wife and mother from Klarinet tragically lost her life at the hands of her husband in what appears to be another gender based violence crime, after her husband murdered her and then shot himself in a murder-suicide plot that seems to have been a long time coming.

In the early hours of Saturday, June 29, Bongani Selby Mdluli (32) shot himself after allegedly strangling and beating his wife, Gomolemo Mogapi (27) to death. Earlier, Mdluli took his two children to their tenants on the property and asked them to look after them to save them from the horror that was being planned in their home.

 

Mdluli sent smses just after midnight to various family and friends, allegedly asking them for forgiveness, that life is difficult and giving them the pin code to his bank account. Early in the morning, Mdluli’s cousin went to the house where she discovered the tragedy. Mdluli and his wife were both lying lifeless on their bed, a firearm lying next to them. She quickly went to the police to report her horrific finding.

Upon arrival SAPS found the couple. The wife had injuries to the left side of her head and the husband had shot himself. The children were allegedly sleeping in their bedroom when the police arrived. Whether they had seen their parents or even knew what had happened in the bedroom right next to theirs is anyone’s guess.

 

Neighbours and friends are shocked at what has occurred, as these types of violent crimes don’t usually take place in the small tight-knit community. WITBANK NEWS reached out to surrounding neighbours of where the gruesome events unfolded to get their version of what took place – and depending on whether you talk to the men or the women, the story differs greatly.

 

According to Mdluli’s friend, Moses Mphambo, he never saw this coming. “I never knew of any problems in their home. He sent me a SMS saying goodbye to me and I didn’t put two and two together. I didn’t ever expect that he could do something like this. There we no financial problems in the home. His business was doing well. He gave a lot of work to other men in the community. I have known him since 2018 and would never have thought he would take the life of his wife and himself. I am sad that I have lost my friend,” Mphambo commented.

 

According to the ladies from the community, this was allegedly not the first time that Mdluli had shown aggression and extreme violence towards his wife, but they have asked to remain anonymous.

 

“He is well known in the community, and none of the men will speak out against the monster he really was towards his wife in the months preceding this tragedy. A lot of the men in the community were given employment by him as he had his own business,” one community member informed WITBANK NEWS.

 

According to their allegations, Mdluli had a severe drinking problem, which could possibly have been the cause of all the marital problems between him and his wife.

 

“Recently he spent over R15 000 on alcohol, which started a big fight between him and his wife. A few months ago, he strangled her to the point where she passed out and wet herself. When she came out of the house asking neighbours for help, he started throwing her things out into the street, shouting and screaming at her and telling her to go back to her family in Rustenburg. She came back to him less than two months ago and now this has happened,” one neighbour alleged.

“She wasn’t allowed to speak to any of the women in the community, not even her direct neighbours. He would lock her inside the house during the day when he went to work to prevent her from leaving or talking to anybody,” another neighbour alleged.

 

“She always looked like a ghost, and she never spoke to any of us, but we could hear the fighting and screams coming from their house. Now their poor children have no mother or father. Lately the only time we would see her is when they drove down the road together and she would just wave and look down when we greeted them,” a third neighbour alleged.

 

WITBANK NEWS reached out to the ward councillor for the community but she declined to give comment at this time as police investigations were still underway. Members of the family have also declined to comment as they are currently too traumatised to speak to the media.

 

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