She said on Monday she arrived at her home in Nteke, west of Durban, to find it swarming with neighbours, police officers and paramedics.
“I thought, what would I have been left with without my children? I was not okay that day,” she said.
The mother was at work when the alleged poisoning took place.
A relative who spoke to Times Select at the home on Monday said the couple was having marital problems and the family tried to mediate on Sunday.
Police spokesperson Col Thembeka Mbele confirmed the incident: “It is alleged the father poisoned himself and children.”
The man’s brother-in-law recalled earlier how the family tried to help.
“We are in pain and we tried to prevent this, but we were too late,” he said.
He said the father, who did odd jobs, had called him on Monday morning, hours before the incident, to say he had taken his wife’s car and intended burning it.
“I told him not to go home and that I was on my way to try to fix the situation. I told my sister not to go home and to call the cops so we could go with them.”
KZN boys ‘poisoned by their dad’ on the road to recovery, says mom
Journalist
Image: SANDILE NDLOVU
A KwaZulu-Natal mother said her two sons are on the road to recovery after their father allegedly poisoned them and himself on Monday.
Speaking to Times Select on Wednesday, the mother, who cannot be named to protect the identities of the boys aged 10 and four, said they were doing well.
The two boys and their father were airlifted to hospital on Monday afternoon.
“The oldest is now talking. He recognises me and even remembers what happened that day,” said the mother while she was visiting her children in hospital.
Her husband was also recovering.
She said on Monday she arrived at her home in Nteke, west of Durban, to find it swarming with neighbours, police officers and paramedics.
“I thought, what would I have been left with without my children? I was not okay that day,” she said.
The mother was at work when the alleged poisoning took place.
A relative who spoke to Times Select at the home on Monday said the couple was having marital problems and the family tried to mediate on Sunday.
Police spokesperson Col Thembeka Mbele confirmed the incident: “It is alleged the father poisoned himself and children.”
The man’s brother-in-law recalled earlier how the family tried to help.
“We are in pain and we tried to prevent this, but we were too late,” he said.
He said the father, who did odd jobs, had called him on Monday morning, hours before the incident, to say he had taken his wife’s car and intended burning it.
“I told him not to go home and that I was on my way to try to fix the situation. I told my sister not to go home and to call the cops so we could go with them.”
The car was tracked to their home.
Neighbours watched in dismay as a military helicopter took the trio to iNkosi Albert Luthuli Central Hospital in Durban. They compared the incident to that of Pinetown father Sibusiso Mpungose, who is serving four life sentences for murdering his four children.
Mpungose was arrested in September after Kuhlekonke, 4, Siphesihle, 10, and Khwezi, 6, were found hanging in their Wyebank home by their mother, Xolisile. The body of his stepdaughter, Ayakha, 17, was found in New Germany.
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