A suspect has been detained in the matter.
Mpumalanga ANC acting secretary Lindiwe Mabona-Ntshalintshali says anything could have happened to her, including being raped and also killed when four armed men pounced on her and her elder sister Zanele.
Ntshalintshali who is currently being visited by friends, comrades and family members at her eMalahleni home following the ordeal that lasted hours said she is still traumatised by the last Wednesday hostage ordeal and doesn’t think she is ready to drive a car anytime soon…
She was coming from the home of Nokhaya Mnisi, the ANC parliamentarian who died on 18 September 2018 of a short illness in Standerton, and had asked Zanele to accompany her to see the bereaved family on behalf of the ANC “feeling bored to drive alone the whole distance”.
She told 013NEWS on Sunday morning that she was glad that they neither took her life nor raped her…
Rape would have made the current trauma worse, she said, “but I’m glad they didn’t take our lives, whatever personal belongings they took it’s fine because there is no other life. Life is once”.
Ntshalintshali, who was a driving a maroon Mercedes Benz GLC Coupè, said they were forced into the back seat of her own car before the armed men drove off with them from Ogies to bushes in Bronkhospruit, she thought “I will never see my kids again. These people are going to kill me”.
She said it was around 6h30 in the evening of Wednesday last week when she left the Mnisi home and shot straight to eMalahleni, first to drop Zanele off in Ogies.
Ntshalintshali said the ordeal began from the time she dropping off Zanele at her gate in Phola township’s Ezitandini section when the four armed men pounced and told them to sit in the back seat.
The former eMalahleni mayor said: “One of the men was sitting at the back with us and the two in the front seat. He was pointing a fire-arm at us and at times he would hit us with the gun when he felt we were not complying. For example, there was a time when my phone dialled itself while it was in my pocket and it was connected to the car’s bluetooth. He hit me with the pistol and demanded the phone and that of my sister.
“The fourth one was in another car that was driving in front of us and leading the way.
“From Ogies they shot straight towards the Kusile power station and proceeded to join the N4 to Pretoria. Somewhere in Bronkhospruit they offramped until they took a gravel road around that area and they parked near the bushes and that’s where they began removing the car’s tracker,” she said when she spoke to the 013NEWS reporter over the phone on Sunday morning.
Her money, cellphone and other personal belongings were taken from her.
In those bushes, the men left them and vanished with the Merc.
She said they began walking until they saw the N4. She said in that moment a group of white tourists were using the gravel road but one of their cars had a break down and when they saw them they went straight to them.
“I told them we had been hijacked and we were asking to use their cellphone. They gave us and I called my husband. But my husband’s number was busy and then I called Mam Linah Malatjie, the current mayor of eMalahleni. I told her we’ve been hijacked and she said ‘I know’ because when they tried to remove the tracker it alerted the tracker company, the tracker guys called my husband to tell them the tracker was being tampered with and they activated the cops who began the search,” she said.
They were found near the highway and her car was found at a guesthouse in Ekangala.
Police spokesman Colonel Mtsholi Bhembe thanked the “swift action by the police [that] led to the recovery of the victim’s vehicle at a guesthouse at Ekangala”.
“A 35-year-old man linked to the hijacking and kidnapping of the former executive mayor of the eMalahleni local municipality will appear in court soon,” Bhembe said.
He said both Ntshalintshali and Zanele were dropped off around the Balmoral area.
The man will appear in two courts – first in Ekangala for possession of stolen goods and then in Ogies for hijacking.
(edited by ZK)
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