The Sunday News
Fairness Moyana Sunday News Correspondent
A FORMER police officer from Lupane who axed his wife after she had threatened to evict him from his own homestead, was on Wednesday sentenced to 18 years imprisonment after Bulawayo High Court judge Justice Martin Makonese found him guilty of murder with constructive intent. Passing sentence during the Hwange High Court circuit, Justice Makonese, sitting with assessors Elias Ndlovu and Felix Bhobhote Dube, dismissed Dubilizwe Mnkandla’s defence that he did not foresee the impact of his actions when he used minimum force as he struck and killed his estranged wife, Sambulo, with an axe.
“The court dismisses your claims that you did not intend to kill your wife and that you only wanted to cause her pain by hitting her on the shoulder with minimum force, which is contrary to the postmortem results. This court finds you guilty of murder with constructive intent,” said Justice Makonese.
Giving evidence, Mnkandla, whose bid for plea to a lesser charge of culpable homicide was crushed by the State, told the court that while he had no intentions of killing his wife, he had acted recklessly at the spur of the moment.
“My Lord I had no intention of killing my wife. I was overwhelmed with anger after she told me that her cousin was going to be permanently staying with us. I tried to inquire why she did not inform me of that and she lashed out at me by telling me that she had a protection order that gave her powers to even evict me from my own homestead.
“It is then that I swung the axe I was carrying using my right, intending to hit her with the back of it. She ducked, resulting in my failure to react in time. The axe struck her at the back of the head and she dropped to the ground and was still. That is when I realised that she was dead. I was reckless to cause her death, my Lord,” said Mnkandla.
He added that he was shocked by her statements because he thought the matter of his infidelity had been resolved by his paying an ox and her returning home. This, he said, added to his fury.
State prosecutor Miss Namatirai Ngwasha told the court that Mnkandla and his wife who was 46 years old when she met her death started having marital problems when the deceased caught wind that her husband was allegedly having an affair with his brother’s wife.
The constant misunderstandings and fights that arose from the issue resulted in the deceased obtaining a protection order against Mnkandla who had begun to physically assault her.
He was served with the protection order on 22 September 2014.
Mnkandla then sought audience with his in-laws in an effort to resolve the problem customarily and was ordered to compensate his wife with an ox for the wrong he had done to her.
The matter was resolved after he agreed to their demands before he left for his homestead while his wife followed a little later accompanied by her cousin.
On 26 September while they were returning home at around 9am after working in the fields a misunderstanding erupted after the deceased told Mnkandla that she could have him evicted from the homestead since she had powers from the protection order.
This did not go down well with the former cop who in a fit of rage swung the axe that he was carrying and struck Sambulo at the back of the head once as she tried to duck after sensing danger.
She died on the spot.
Mnkandla was represented by Givemore Muvhiringi of Dube and Company.
