Olievenhoutbosch community recalls how bogus sangoma led to local serial killer being caught

JOHANNESBURG - A community in Olievenhoutbosch has recalled how it took a bogus sangoma for a local serial killer who murdered her lovers to be caught.

Forty-seven-year-old Pamela Solani was handed three life sentences in June after the discovery of three bodies in her yard.

After murdering her first boyfriend with her other lover, she then drowned him months later with her son, whom she later also murdered.

ALSO READ: Serial killer Pamela Selani's aunt opens up on life with her niece, believes she was next target

Pamela Solani’s youngest son, Sithenkosi Jongwa, was just 14 when he saw his mother bury the body of his older brother in their yard after he threatened to report her to the police.

He also knew that two of his mother’s boyfriends were buried in the same place after she murdered them - one with a hammer and one by poisoning and suffocation.

After months of telling anybody who would listen about his mother’s crimes, she decided to take him to a sangoma to prove that he was mentally unwell. However, it was the sangoma who would call Kgomotso, a community leader who pretended to be another sangoma.

"I wore a doek and I picked some leaves to look like muthi. When I saw the boy, I told him to put the muthi on his hands and told him to swear to tell the truth. He told me everything and said his mother would come back later, and that was when I called the police to arrest her."

Kgomotso testified in the trial against Solani, telling the court what Jongwa told her during their bogus consultation.

She said it was her love for her community and the truth that pushed her to take on the character of a sangoma in the quest for justice.