Cape Town | Tuesday
A SECURITY guard accused of killing former South African first lady Marike de Klerk told a Cape Town court on Tuesday that she had been murdered by her dance instructor.
Luyanda Mboniswa said dance teacher John Teubes had persuaded him to help burgle her beach-front apartment and when De Klerk surprised them, Teubes stabbed her and strangled her.
The 21-year-old Mboniswa, who was applying for bail in the Cape Town Regional Court, claimed that Teubes had been De Klerk’s boyfriend and had said there was a lot of money in the apartment, offering him R20 000 (about $1 600) to take part in the burglary.
Mboniswa was arrested two days after De Klerk, the ex-wife of South Africa’s last white president FW de Klerk, was found dead at her home in Bloubergstrand outside Cape Town on December 5.
He declined on Tuesday to answer questions from state prosecutor Tessa Heunis, who said evidence showed that Teubes was at home at the time of the murder.
Police representative Wicus Holtzhausen told the media that Teubes had cooperated with the police investigation and that there was no evidence to arrest him.
“We did question him and he co-operated fully,” Holtzhausen said.
Mboniswa, a Xhosa speaker from Khayelitsha township, worked at the apartment building where De Klerk lived and was traced by police investigators after he made a phone call from her stolen mobile phone.
He subsequently confessed before a magistrate that he was involved in the murder, which triggered an outcry and saw FW de Klerk call for a renewed campaign to curb rampant crime in South Africa. – AFP