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INLSA<\/p>\n
Members of the Senior Citizen Forum protest outside the Ntuzuma Magistrates Court during the bail application of 11 people accused of killing an elderly couple for alleged witchcraft. Picture: Doctor Ngcobo<\/p>\n
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The bail application of 10 men and one woman charged with the murder of an elderly couple earlier this month was postponed in the Ntuzuma Magistrate\u2019s Court yesterday. <\/p>\n
Elsa Dubazane, 63, of Lindelani, near Ntuzuma, was burnt to death by a mob in her home while her seven-year-old grandson cried and begged the mob to leave her alone. <\/p>\n
He was pulled from the blaze by the mob, but his pleas fell on deaf ears. <\/p>\n
Dubazane\u2019s husband, Raphael Zukhulu, 63, managed to escape from the burning house. <\/p>\n
However, the mob caught him a few metres away from the house, put a tyre around his neck and set it alight. <\/p>\n
Originally, 10 people appeared at the Ntuzuma Magistrate\u2019s Court last week. <\/p>\n
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Two of the 11 suspects accused of burning an elderly couple to death make their way to court for their bail hearing. Picture: Doctor Ngcobo<\/p>\n
INLSA<\/span><\/p>\n However, the police made a breakthrough, arresting another man, and 11 appeared yesterday. <\/p>\n The accused in the case cannot be named because doing so could jeopardise the investigation. <\/p>\n In the days before the couple\u2019s death, their house was ransacked by a mob looking for a baboon that had allegedly been used for witchcraft. <\/p>\n The mob also alleged that the couple had buried their 16-year-old granddaughter, Zakude Shozi, in their yard because the community had not seen her funeral. <\/p>\n Shozi died in the Mahatma Gandhi Hospital in Phoenix. <\/p>\n However, even after Dubazane showed them the death certificate and a receipt from a funeral parlour the mob still attacked and assaulted her and Zukhulu. <\/p>\n They returned to kill the couple later. <\/p>\n Yesterday, a police spokesman, Captain Thulani Zwane, said that more arrests were likely to be made. <\/p>\n Protest <\/p>\n In the packed courtroom, the magistrate ruled that the case had to be postponed for the investigating officer to verify the alternative addresses of the accused if they received bail. <\/p>\n The 11 accused will remain in custody until their next court appearance on February 8. <\/p>\n Outside the court, angry relatives gathered and demanded answers from the police. <\/p>\n A small group of Senior Citizen Forum members also gathered to protest outside the court. They sang songs and held placards and posters reading: \u201cNo elderly abuse. We will fight until the end. No bail. Ugogo wami, ugogo wakho nawe.<\/em> (My grandmother is your grandmother.)\u201d <\/p>\n Leading the protests was the forum\u2019s chairwoman, Patricia Ballantyne. <\/p>\n She said that the youth needed to take care of their elders. <\/p>\n \u201cI was hurt by the incident, and as the forum we are here to voice ourselves and disagree with what happened to the two elderly people,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n \u201cWe want to raise awareness that the youth must treat the elderly with care.\u201d <\/p>\n Queeneth Mkhabela-Castiano, an acting general manager at the KwaZulu-Natal premier\u2019s office, said Zukhulu\u2019s funeral had already taken place. <\/p>\n \u201cWe are trying to locate Dubazane\u2019s family so that we can organise a funeral,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n \u201cThe grandchild is in a safe place.\u201d <\/p>\n She added that her office was working with the police. <\/p>\n \u201cTheir house is vacant and we do not want people to abuse it,\u201d said Mkhabela-Castiano. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" INLSA Members of the Senior Citizen Forum protest outside the Ntuzuma Magistrates Court during the bail application of 11 people accused of killing an elderly couple for alleged witchcraft. Picture: Doctor Ngcobo The bail application of 10 men and one woman charged with the murder of an elderly couple earlier this month was postponed in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[8275,953,2143],"class_list":{"0":"post-7450","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-durban","8":"tag-newspaper","9":"tag-the-mercury","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7450","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7450"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7450\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7450"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7450"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7450"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}