Mpumalanga Man Arrested After Allegedly Killing, Burying Elder Sister in a Shallow Grave

• The South African Police Service arrested a man from Mpumalanga who allegedly confessed to killing his sister
• The suspect and his sister allegedly got into a fight in White River almost a year ago on 29 May 2024
• He allegedly killed her and buried her in a shallow grave, and he confessed to members of the public who alerted the police

Tebogo Mokwena, a Briefly News current affairs journalist based in Johannesburg, South Africa, covered a range of criminal activities, including cash-in-transit heists, kidnappings, taxi violence, police investigations, police shootouts, and court cases at Daily Sun for over three years.

WHITE RIVER, MPUMALANGA — The South African Police Service arrested a 30-year-old man from White River in Mpumalanga for allegedly killing his sister in May 2024.

Man allegedly confesses to killing sister

According to TimesLIVE, the incident happened on 29 May last year. The suspect and his 4-year-old sister reportedly got into a heated argument, which became fatal. He allegedly killed her and buried her in a shallow grave in his yard.

He reportedly kept the murder a secret and recently confessed to other community members. The community members alerted the police, who acted and arrested the suspect on 3 June 2025. The police have not exhumed the body yet.

Crime and murder in SA

In 2024, South Africa was ranked as the country with the second-highest homicide rate in Africa. Data Pandas released a report in December that showed the country ranked behind Lesotho. According to the South African Police Service, 6545 people were murdered between July and September 2024. It revealed that 70 people were murdered every day between July and September 2024.

SAPS revealed in February 2025 that crime decreased during the third quarter of the previous financial year. Police Minister Senzo Mchunu revealed in Pretoria that the country experienced a 9.8% decrease in murder cases compared to the same period in the previous financial year. This meant that 757 fewer murders were committed.

People who killed relatives in South Africa

• South Africans were horrified when a KwaZulu-Natal man killed his 87-year-old mother and 39-year-old sister in December 2023 and decapitated them
• A man from Bergville, KwaZulu-Natal, was arrested after stabbing seven relatives and three children in October 2024 and fatally murdering five of them
• A 33-year-old man was arrested for killing three relatives in Taung, North West, in November 2024 after attacking them with a knobkerrie
• A Free State man was arrested on 16 May 2025 after stabbing his mother and sister, who died, while his mother sustained injuries
• A Mpumalanga man was arrested on 28 May for allegedly killing his stepdaughter for refusing to sell their shack

Court sentences woman for orchestrating family massacre

In a related article, Briefly News reported that a woman from Brits in the north West was sentenced after she was found guilty of planning to kill her entire family. Her parents and siblings were massacred in 2016.

The woman, Onthatile Sebati, paid her cousins to massacre her family. However, in 2021, she handed herself over to the police.

Source: Briefly News