WOMAN WATCHES ARMED BURGLARS HANG HER SON

MBABANE - “Shouting the name of Jesus Christ saved the day for my family.”

This is what Busisiwe Majola (55) had to say after she and her two children survived three hours of being held hostage by burglars at Ndzingeni .
Majola said she couldn’t believe it when she woke up with a gun held against her forehead, last week Saturday at her homestead.

Ordeal

Relating her ordeal, Majola said that being a prayerful woman, when she opened her eyes and saw one man with a knife on the neck of her 12-year-old son and another with a gun on her head, she shouted the name of Jesus Christ aloud. “I was shocked and scared for my children and pleaded  with the three armed men to spare their lives and only kill me instead. “As I was held at gunpoint, another came pushing my 17-year-old daughter into the room where we were.

Tied

“They then took  brown adhessive tape and tied our hands and feet and further wrapped our mouths to keep us quite,” she said. Majola said she earns a living by buying  and reselling clothes she purchases from Durban, South Africa. Narrating the fateful night, she said after the burglars tied  up their hands and feet, they took ropes and tied them around each of the children necks and warned that that if she didn’t show them where she had hidden the money she made from her business  they would hang everyone from the roof rafters.

“Out of fear, I showed them the safe where the money is always placed.  After they realised that it was only E9 000, they then began assaulting us with open hands and kicks, demanding that I show them where I had hidden the rest of the money,” said Majola. She said they further plugged in an iron and told her they would use it to burn her and the children if she did not show them the rest of the money. “Their plan was to use the hot iron to taunt me until I tell them where I hid the rest of the money. “For what I estimated to be 40 minutes or more,  they struggled to turn on the  iron  and eventually decided to use other means to taunt me.

Threatened

“They then took my 12-year-old son and pulled him by the rope, tied it around his neck and threatened to hang him. “I couldn’t control myself as I could picture my son being hanged to death. “As I screamed, they continued to hang him on the rafters and when I saw my son gasping for breath, I just cried hysterically, telling them repeatedly that I  had no more money,” said a visibly shaken Majola. She said one of the burglars then showed compassion as he ordered that her son not be  killed. Instead, he started talking about his own experience  at the hands of burglars with his mother while he was five years old.  “He told us that he decided to be involved in armed robberies as a result of anger and revenge, since his mother was killed by armed robbers.

Killed

“He said that the robbers only spared his life, but eventually killed the rest of his family members during a break-in. He said that he decided to be an armed robber due to anger,” said Majola. The burglars ransacked the whole house looking for more money while they were tied for over three hours.
“There was a disagreement between the burglars as another was demanding that we be all killed while the other pleaded that we shouldn’t be killed. The big concern was we would identify them since they did not cover their faces,” said Majola. The armed robbers are said to have finally left in the early morning hours, around  1.30am.

“Immediately after they left, we tried to untie ourselves and raised the alarm, which our  neighbours responded to, and immediately engaged the community police members. However the community police members were not able to catch them.  “I then reported the incident to the Royal Eswatini Police (REPS) in Pigg’s Peak, who  came the following morning at around 6am to conduct their own investigations,” said Majola.
Deputy Chief Police Information and Communication Officer, Nosipho Mnguni confirmed the incident and said investigations were currently ongoing.

Escalating

It is worth noting that armed robberies cases have been escalating recently and Ndzingeni is one of their hotspots. In most cases, people have been killed in armed robbers. Most recently in Fonteyn, a family was also held hostage for over six hours by armed men.

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