Johannesburg - Sindisiwe Manqele’s behaviour on the night she allegedly killed her rapper boyfriend was so disturbing that she had to be put in the back of a police van.
This is according to Thapelo Sello, a close friend of slain Skwatta Kamp member Nkululeko “Flabba” Habedi.
Sello was testifying in Manqele’s murder trial in the high court sitting in Randburg on Tuesday.
The business studies student has pleaded not guilty to the murder and said she stabbed him in self-defence.
During the second day of her murder trial on Tuesday, Manqele again covered her head with a scarf and sobbed during proceedings.
Sello, who was at Habedi’s Alexandra home the night he was killed, told the court that after she killed her lover, she acted “possessed”.
He said she was initially remorseful and emotional after she realised she had fatally stabbed him. She had tried to resuscitate him.
Sello said that after Habedi was declared dead and police arrived at the scene, the rapper’s wife Mpho, who he was divorcing, arrived.
Manqele’s behaviour then changed “drastically from remorse to extreme anger”, and she was behaving as if she were possessed.
When she saw her lover’s wife, he said, she swore at her and said “you’re not the f***ing wife! What are you doing here?” Mpho allegedly remained silent and Manqele was restrained by being put at the back of a police van.
The defence accused Sello of bringing evidence into the court “through the back door” because he hadn’t included it in his police statement. Sello said he had been confused at the time and did not remember all the details.
Sello, as well as Habedi’s younger cousin Mpho Motsoari, told the court that the rapper confessed to them that he and his lover were fighting because she saw him talking to another woman.
This was during a night out at The Sands nightclub in Sandton on March 9, hours before Habedi was killed.
Both men testified that after the couple returned, Manqele rushed to the rapper’s bedroom. They said Habedi told them he would explain the quarrel involving the other woman to them after he had spoken to his girlfriend.
Habedi had gone inside the house, only to find his bedroom door locked.
He had pleaded with Manqele to open it.
But only after he had knocked on the window did she open the door for him.
Motsoari and Sello said they heard the couple arguing inside the room. About 30 minutes, they heard the rapper screaming: “This b**ch just stabbed me!”
They and other relatives ran inside and found the rapper lying on his back and bleeding from the chest.
The Star