He Felt Worthless

The wife of late Yizo Yizo star Jabu Kubheka opens up about the depression that led to her husband’s suicide

- Aphiwe Boyce

SHE should have realised something was wrong when he didn’t come out to open the gate for her as he usually did when she got home from work.

Puzzled, she walked into the house and went through to the bedroom – where a grim sight awaited her: her husband was hanging from the burglar bars.

At first she thought he was playing a prank on her – the actor in him couldn’t help playing the fool from time to time, she says.

“I said, ‘Babayi, haha, don’t do that!’ Then I realised his feet were not on the bed but actually hanging in the air . . .”

Frantic, Cynthia Khumalo (48) ran outside to call her neighbours for help and they all rushed back to the bedroom of the Soshanguve house. But it was too late: Jabu Kubheka, the bad boy of TV everyone loved or loved to hate, was dead.

“We called the police and they came quickly,” Cynthia says. “I tried to touch my husband but they stopped me. I was numb – I didn’t feel shock at that stage or scream or anything. I was just calm. I think God was inside me and He just took charge.”

But the numbness has worn off now and the pain is almost unbearable. Jabu, who made a name for himself as one of TV’s most charismatic criminals – first as Gunman, the perennial criminal with a gift for storytelling on the hit series Yizo Yizo, and then as the no-nonsense Bazooka on Zone 14 – will never open the gate for her again.

News of the 48-year-old’s suicide spread like wildfire, leaving his fans and the entertainment industry in shock.

Jabu’s family was so distraught they initially blamed Cynthia for his death, she says – until they read his suicide note. “Sorry, I am gone baby, I am dead ekamereni lakho nendoda yakho (in our bedroom),” his note said.