By: Annakleta Haikera
“My inlaw was a very violent man to my sister, and he was always beating her.” These are the words of Gloria Samati, the sister to 33-year-old Ive Njahi Mapenzi, whose brutal death at the alleged hands of her husband, brought the entire Zambezi, and the nation at large to a standstill.
Gloria can barely contain her words as she speaks, and her voice cracks with grief. The family has, not only lost a sister, a mother of three, and a daughter; Mapenzi was the breadwinner, a soul loved by all she encountered.
“She was the breadwinner in the house, and she was taking care of him because he was unemployed. My sister was working very hard to provide for her family just like any mother in the house,” she tells The Villager.
Mapenzi died in the early morning hours of Wednesday, between midnight and 1 am. Her husband, 38-year-old Matengu Simasiku, allegedly hit her with a steel hammer before violently cutting her throat with a knife in their homestead at Shungu village in Sinai location of Kongola constituency. Police media liaison officer inspector Rambert Muronga confirmed the incident.
Mapenzi had three children of which the firstborn was not fathered by her husband. Simasiku sired two children with his wife, a 6-year-old boy, and a 15-month-old girl, who was still being breastfed.
“I can describe my brother-in-law very well. Me and him have no relationship as inlaws should. I have not spoken to him for six good months; he was cruel, violent, and a big abuser to my sister. He used to beat her whenever they argued, and because she never wanted to leave him, that’s why we didn’t intervene. I remember when I told my sister to leave him, he threatened to kill me, and he was insulting me every day. Luckily enough, I moved to Ondangwa.”
Gloria says her sister was killed while sleeping because the two had a huge misunderstanding on Tuesday, 6 September at around 6 pm when she came home from work and didn’t find her husband at home.
Later that evening when the husband came home that’s when the argument started, Gloria narrates.
Mapenzi and her husband lived in a compound together while her other, older sister, Nancy Samati, and mother, Alfonsina Samati, live in the courtyard.
On the day of her sister’s death, Gloria recalls that, after the marital argument, “my mother intervened, and it all stopped and they both went to bed. I am very much positive that the husband waited for my sister to fall asleep before he started slaughtering her.”
“The people in the house didn’t hear any shouts or screams and they were woken up by the police car that came in the house and said that the owner of the house, who is my sister, was dead. My big sister was shocked and in disbelief so she had to go inside the house and see it for herself. That’s when she witnessed something that I know she will never forget.”
She says Mapenzi’s body was found naked and her mouth and eye were open. Simasiku is an alleged frequent marijuana smoker.
“Maybe that’s why he was not remorseful because a normal person cannot kill your loved one and hand yourself to the police just like that. He is very cruel, and I want him to face justice.”
Gloria says above all, she is concerned for her nieces and nephews, who must now go through life without a mother, a father in custody.
“They don’t have a father nor a mother, and it’s because the father decided to shorten the mother’s life here on earth. The family members of my brother-in-law don’t even care about these two children, and neither us the siblings. When this incident happened on Wednesday, no one came to confront us about what transpired between the two couples. I am sad. I have lost a younger sister, and I pray that God will hear our prayers.”
Mapenzi will be buried on Saturday in Katima Mulilo’s Dairy Cemetery.
