Durban — The families of the eThekwini water and sanitation unit managers who have been killed have urged the police to speed up their investigations and arrest the killers.
Emmanuel Ntuli, Khumbulani Khumalo and Phumzile Qatha were gunned down between April last year and last week.
Ntuli was the acting senior manager of the unit’s plants and logistics department.
Speaking at his memorial service on Thursday, his brother, Mncengeni Ntuli, said the family was grieving and hurt by his death.
He was grateful to hear the tributes paid to his brother and confirmation that he did his work with “utmost diligence”.
He said Ntuli was a good husband and father to his children, “and a great brother to us”.
“We have lost someone who always instilled hope in us. What hurts the most is that what happened occurred in the most brutal way possible. I do not know how his children will be able to overcome this very traumatic experience,” he said.
Mncengeni Ntuli called on the police to speed up investigations into his brother’s killing.
“My brother is now considered as another murder statistic. There are so many cases that come before his death and remain unsolved, but for us as a family he is more than just a number. It is about unnaturally losing a father, a brother and a family member,” he said.
Ntuli’s killing follows that of his colleague, Khumbulani Khumalo. Khumalo was a manager in the unit’s community service department. He was killed in September.
Khumalo’s children urged police to find his killers so that they could start their healing process.
His son, Njabulo Khumalo, the eldest of six children, said without the arrest of their father’s killers, the family would continue to be in anguish.
Khumalo was killed while preparing to get married next month.
“His death left has us confused and when we returned to work after the funeral, we were unable to cope with the loss. Our two-year-old brother is badly affected. He keeps asking for our father and wakes up crying in the night for him,” he said.
Njabulo Khumalo said if police did not arrest his killers they would continue on their killing spree.
“This thing is continuing as my father’s friend, who worked with him in the same department, was killed last week. We don’t know if it’s related but it’s too much of a coincidence. The fact that no one has been arrested means the killers are still out there. For us, the wounds from losing our father remain open. It would have been better if the police had found the suspects. At least we would have some closure. But they have done nothing,” he said.
Khumalo said they were yet to be contacted by police about the investigation.
“The police have not come to our family, no phone call from them. The last time we communicated it was me who went to them to get an update, and I was told that the investigating officer was on leave. I was told that police had applied for my father’s phone to be taken for forensic investigations but that was just it,” he said.
Khumalo expressed doubt about the police’s commitment to make an arrest.
“They are giving us nothing. There is no update, it is just as if an insect was killed,” he said.
He said his family was desperate to hear from police why Khumalo was killed.
“We need to know. We need answers. Was it related to his work? We don’t know for sure but suspect that it might be because we heard that his colleague (Ntuli) was killed last week,” said Njabulo.
In April last year Qatha, who was responsible for assigning tankers to deliver water to communities, was killed.
Her killing took place at the height of Durban’s water woes when infrastructure was damaged and water supply in various areas was either cut off or rationed due to the floods.
Qatha, from the Eastern Cape, was stationed at the water and sanitation unit in Ottawa.
The Sunday Tribune was unable to get comment from her family at the time of going to print.
Meanwhile, eThekwini mayor Mxolisi Kaunda has complained to KwaZulu-Natal police commissioner Lieutenant-General Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi about the snail’s pace of the investigations into the murder of three of the City’s water and sanitation officials.
Kaunda said this when he addressed mourners at the memorial service for Emmanuel Ntuli, the acting senior manager of the water and sanitation unit: plants and logistics.
Ntuli, who was shot dead at his home in Mandeni on the North Coast on Friday last week, was the third water and sanitation unit person to be murdered.
His colleagues, community services manager Khumbulani Khumalo and Phumzile Qatha, who was responsible for assigning tankers to deliver water to communities, were killed in Durban on September 29 and April 24 last year respectively.
No arrests have been made.
Kaunda said he told Mkhwanazi that he was not seeing much progress with the investigations.
“The people who should be arrested are those who pull the trigger and the big fish who make these calls,” he said.
KZN police spokesperson Colonel Robert Netshiunda said police were still investigating the murders and had no knowledge of the mayor discussing the cases with police.
“If there is a crime that has been committed, we investigate. If there is any murder that has been committed, we investigate.
“If the municipality believes that there are issues going on, they are the ones that must touch base with the police. Then the police will investigate what they are saying,” he said.
Netshiunda urged the municipality to make contact with him about cases that had been opened “so that I can go and investigate as to how far we are with the investigations”.
When asked about investigations into Khumalo’s death, Netshiunda would not reveal if anyone had been arrested. He said it was being investigated.
Meanwhile, the City’s human settlements and infrastructure services committee chairperson, Themba Mvubu, appealed to members of the public to help the police solve the murder of the water and sanitation unit managers.
Mvubu, who started as a committee chairperson in February, said he had no knowledge of the progress of either the police’s or the municipality’s internal investigations into the deaths.
“But if there has been any investigation, I want to assure you that it has never been brought to my attention,” Mvubu said.
He pledged that his cluster would co-operate with the police to ensure that cases were resolved.
“If there is anyone, such as a whistle-blower, who might have evidence to assist the police, we encourage them to do that because we are uncompromising when it comes to dealing with corruption,” said Mvubu.
A senior council officer, who asked not to be named because he was not allowed to speak to the media, said the City’s Integrity and Investigation Unit (CIIU) would be conducting its own investigation into corruption that was apparently linked to the murders.
“The CIIU had been dysfunctional, which was why it was very difficult in the past, but they have appointed a new head who we hope will clean up the system,” the official said.
Sunday Tribune