A member of a three-man panga gang that stabbed a woman and chopped her fingers off for muti was yesterday convicted by the East London Magistrate’s Court.
Zola “Twenty” Bonani, 29, was found guilty of robbery with aggravating circumstances and two counts of assault with intent to cause grievous bodily harm.
Regional magistrate Dan Ngoqo said Bonani was “very lucky” that he was only charged with serious assault and not attempted murder, adding that the men’s actions showed that they had intended to kill tomato factory worker Nongetheni Mtshini 62.
Although she survived the attack, the loss of her right thumb and little finger cost her job.
Ngoqo said he would give his reasons for finding Bonani guilty today when he delivers his sentence this morning.
Bonani, and two accomplices still at large, stormed into Mtshini’s shack on a farm near Gonubie in October 2009 and robbed her of R500, before hacking her numerous times in the head and body.
They used the panga to chop off her right hand thumb and little finger, causing her injuries that left her spending six months in Frere Hospital.
The gang also stabbed her 23-year-old daughter Vuyelwa Stofile, who was hospitalised for two weeks.
The other two, identified in court only as Xolani and Thembani, were well known to Mtshini, as they stayed on the same farm.
When Bonani took the stand in his defence yesterday morning, he denied any involvement in the hacking of the women, saying Thembani did it.
Mtshini testified last week that the three men nearly killed her.
“Xolani later took out a knife and grabbed my right hand before he chopped my thumb off and placed it in his pocket saying he was going to use it to make muti. Twenty (Bonani) also pulled out his bush knife and chopped off my little finger. It was so painful and traumatic. Twenty hacked me with a panga and injured me in my stomach, head and back,” Mtshini told the court.
She was working at a tomato factory near Kwelera and lost her job after losing her fingers. — asandan@dispatch.co.za..