Danisa Masuku
Daniel Sibanda hit his wife Sethule Moyo with a sjambok after he discovered that she was trading his sexual goods for a bucket of maize.
After several fruitless efforts to tell her husband to fend for his family Sethule told the court that she ended up devising a survival plan. “I had to engage in transactional sex with a truck driver after my husband failed to fend for the family while he came home drunk, but with no money,” she said.
She said the truck driver would sleep with her for money that could buy a bucket of maize and other necessities.
“I can’t call it a love affair, it’s a batter trade where I would sleep with him and he would give me money to buy 10kg mealie-meal or a bucket of maize and groceries such as sugar and cooking oil. He would also give me cash,” she said.
She added that her husband would get money from piece jobs but he would squander it on booze with friends at Lupane Business Centre. “My husband makes money from piece jobs, but he blows it on beer and comes home drunk. He would demand sadza, when I told him there is no mealie-meal he would hit me with open hands,” she said.
Sethule told the court that her husband last week hit her several times with a sjambok causing her to suffer bruises all over the body.
“My husband last week hit me all over the body with a sjambok, I sustained bruises all over the body and I was failing to sit,” she said.
Thulani admitted that he thumped his wife.
“I got a tip-off that she was seeing a truck driver, after that I ambushed her and caught her with him at Lupane Business Centre and on that day Sethule had left saying she was going to visit her ailing uncle. I had to beat her up.
When I got home in the evening on that particular day, I once again hit her because I had gathered that she had been cheating on me with that truck driver and they were seen on several occasions together,” he said.
He appeared before Lupane resident magistrate Ndumo Masuku facing physical abuse charge. He pleaded guilty.
Thulani was remanded out of custody to next week on Tuesday for sentencing.
