- A police officer accused of murdering his ex-lover appeared in court on Monday.
- Lucky Mudua, who is wheelchair-bound, was escorted by police officers.
- He will be back in court on 20 July.
The police officer accused of killing his ex-lover at the Tembisa Hospital in February, before turning the gun on himself, appeared in court for the first time on Monday.
Lucky Mudau had been in a critical condition in hospital for months, but was escorted in a wheelchair into the Rabasotho Magistrate's Court in Tembisa.
At the time of the incident, Mudau worked at Norkem Park police station.
According to People Opposing Women Abuse (POWA) and the Democratic Nursing Organisation of South Africa (Denosa), Mudau is paralysed from the neck down.
However, a spokesperson for the National Prosecuting Authority, Phindi Mjonondwane, could not confirm his condition. She said she "had no idea".
Mudau is accused of murdering the 30-year-old mother-of-two, Lebo Monene, in the hospital's parking lot in February.
He subsequently shot himself, which resulted in him being hospitalised and kept under police guard.
When he made his first appearance in court on Monday, the matter was postponed because he did not, as yet, have a lawyer.
Monene's father, Nicolas, described the experience as "opening old wounds".
"It was the first time seeing him since the incident and it was painful. I felt the pain, but obviously had to contain myself, so that everything that was meant to happen today could proceed," he said.
"How can we forgive him, knowing that we will never see our child again. We will never forgive him, we have lost a life and it's not a joke. He killed my child."
Nicholas went on to say that Mudau's family had not reached out to apologise, despite the murder charge their son faces.
He said:
Denosa's chairperson, Simphiwe Gada, said the justice system needed to send a strong message to all potential killers.
He said justice for Monene would be where Mudau is "incarcerated for life and lived everyday regretting what he had done, instead of dying, which would be the easy way out".
Gada said Mudau was shaking in court because "reality was beginning to dawn on him", as a result of what he had done.
Because Monene had been a nurse, Gada promised the organisation would support the family until the case came to an end.
"We are not just a union focused on workplace only. This [the murder] has had an impact on nursing, and we fundamentally oppose violence directed at nurses and any form of gender-based violence... thus, we have made time to attend to this matter," said Gada.
POWA's Constance Dlamini told News24 the fact that Mudau was sober when he committed the alleged murder showed he had thought about it. But he still went on to kill someone who had kids, and they now have to grow up without a mother.
She said:
According to Dlamini, POWA was hard at work in fighting gender-based violence.
"Unfortunately, Lebo [Monene] happens to be one of many women who lost their lives and she will not be the last."
Mudau will be back in court on 20 July.
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