Case against couple suspected of murdering two Soweto boys delayed

The pretrial hearing of a Soweto grandmother and her boyfriend who were arrested in connection with the murders of two boys, one of them her grandson, has again been delayed.

Nqobile Ndlovu and Mthunzi Musawenkosi Zulu, charged with two counts of murder, made a brief appearance in the Johannesburg high court on Friday. 

The two were arrested in April last year after the bodies of Tshiamo Rabanye and Mduduzi Nqobizitha Zulu, aged six and five respectively, were found mutilated kilometres apart in Soweto.

The boys were snatched from a park where they were playing with a friend.

Ndlovu was Rabanye's paternal grandmother and guardian at the time of his death, as he was an orphan.

She sported a vastly different look from her previous appearances in court. When the matter sat in the Protea magistrate's court, Ndlovu would often be seen in an all-black ensemble, but on Friday she had a blue scarf tied around her head and was wearing a cream-coloured jersey and spectacles.

Zulu kept his trademark look from the lower court, only switching his chiskop for slightly longer hair.

The pretrial hearing, initially scheduled for early June, had to be postponed for the second time to allow for “negotiations and finalisation of the plea bargain” between the state and defence.

It was postponed to August 8.

Ndlovu and Zulu will remain behind bars after they abandoned their bail bids soon after their arrests.

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