We Can't Say Goodbye

Karabo Mokoena’s family and friends remember her loving nature – and the abuse she suffered at the hands of her alleged killer

- Ruwaydah Harris

CLUSTERS of sombre family, neighbours and friends gather in the spacious lounge of the home in Diepkloof, Soweto, talking in hushed voices. A long table pushed against a wall offers tea, coffee and homemade magwinyas to sympathisers who’ve been filing into the Mokoena home since early morning.

A short passage from the lounge leads to a bedroom where a grief-stricken Lollo Mokoena hunches on a mattress on the floor, her mother-in-law, Elizabeth Mokoena, trying her best to console her.

It’s the day before Mother’s Day – a day Lollo should be celebrating. Instead she’s mourning the brutal murder of her only daughter, Karabo – a death that shocked Mzansi and thrust the incidence of maleon-female abuse back into the spotlight.

Karabo (22) was allegedly killed by her 27-year-old forex trader boyfriend, Sandile Mantsoe, after a fight on 28 April.

Police believe he killed her inside his luxury Sandton Skye apartment and stuffed her body into a Pikitup bin, which he wheeled out to his car. He transferred the body to the boot then drove to an open field in Lyndhurst in southern Joburg, where he put a tyre around Karabo’s neck, poured petrol over her and set her alight.

Lollo can’t bear the thought of her baby girl’s death and breaks down as she tells us of her visit to the site.

“The police took us to see the place where they found the burnt remains of Karabo. You know when you pass by a dead dog that was dumped in a patch of grass and gravel on the side of the road? That was what this place looked like.”

KARABO met Sandile in October last year while they were out with friends at a popular Sandton nightclub. However, the relationship was volatile and soon Karabo was being subjected to abuse, family and friends claim.