‘She was like her second mother, but she murdered my daughter’

THE Pinetown family of a girl whose eyes and tongue were cut out after she was kidnapped and murdered by a neighbour and close friend in 2019, is inconsolable.

They say the murderer was like a second mother to the child, and instead of being a protector, she saw the child as a means to an end of her financial woes.

Zandile Nsele, 43, was sentenced by the Durban High Court to life imprisonment on Tuesday for the murder, but the victim’s father, Mlungisi Nkala, said the sentence was cold comfort and left them wishing that Nsele could also experience the pain she had inflicted on their daughter and family.

Nkala said instead of apologising to the family, Nsele seemed cocky and confident throughout the trial and behaved as though she had received a great reward for the suffering she had put them through. Although she avoided looking at any of his family, Nsele’s lack of remorse has affected them badly.

In June 2019, Sphumelele Mzimba, 11,was lured to Nsele’s home in Nazareth and bound. Later that day, Mzimba’s parents received a call demanding R20 000 for the child’s safe return.

It emerged in court that Nsele had a financial crisis and needed a way out. She believed that the child’s parents had the money. While awaiting a response from the parents, Nsele heard a noise of the passers-by outside her home and Mzimba tried to call out for help. Nsele then tightened the rope around her neck in an attempt to keep her quiet.

When the noise outside died down, Nsele loosened her grip, but Mzimba had suffocated and died. Nsele asked a neighbour to help her dig a shallow grave in a bush nearby. She buried the child and then fled to Johannesburg. But she continued to demand the ransom.

Mzimba’s body was found two weeks after her disappearance and a post mortem revealed that her eyes and tongue had been removed. Nsele was arrested and faced charges of murder, kidnapping and a charge for selling body parts.

Nsele’s prison sentences will run concurrently. She was sentenced to life imprisonment for murder. She received six years for kidnapping, nine years for the attempted extortion and 10 years for contravening the National Health Act.

“We are not happy with the sentence handed down compared to all that she did to our daughter. We had plans for her, she had plans for her life, too, and when we remember her, this causes great pain,” Nkala said.

He said Mzimba was their firstborn followed by two sons. He said she was an open and trusting child who loved everyone around her and she took Nsele as her own mother.

“Nsele was our neighbour and even when she had moved from the area, our daughter visited her frequently.

“Her brothers are not doing well, they have not accepted this, especially her 10-year-old brother who misses her,” he said.