Families of the victims killed in Umlazi, south of Durban, on Monday are shocked about the shooting incident which has left them traumatised.

About seven armed men attacked eight men in a house at Sithabathaba informal settlement in Umlazi N section, killing six and injuring two people who were rushed to a nearby hospital.

Thoko Zikhali, grandmother of Andile Zikhali, whose body was found a few blocks from the house where the rest were killed, said she thinks her grandson succumbed to bullet wounds while seeking help.

“It looks like he was trying to run because his body was the first one we bumped into. We didn’t have the strength to go to the house,” she said.

“We had heard gunshots coming from that direction and went to check with neighbours.”

Originally from Umhlabuyalungana, Zikhali, 31, also known as Flo, had been living with his grandmother from childhood and made a living doing odd jobs as he was unemployed. Although she has other grandchildren, she said Zikhali looked after her.

She said she knew her grandson left their home at about 10am and went to a house in Sithabathaba, where he usually met friends.

The grandmother said she knew he “smoked with his friends in that house” but wasn't sure what they were consuming. 

Another grieving relative, Zamokuhle Hadebe, whose son Sanele Shabalala was killed, said: “We heard gunshots for about 20 minutes from around 1pm coming from the informal settlement on the other side of the railway and everyone was panicking and scared. A few moments later someone told us our son was there so I rushed there.”

Inside the house they found him lying dead with others. Only one man was alive. They found two more people — one dead and the other alive — a few blocks from the scene.

“We are very hurt and shocked because his death was sudden. Yesterday they were walking here. None of them was sick or anything and a few hours later they were gone. The last time we saw him was around noon and we didn’t suspect anything when he left because that’s what he usually did. He left to the house where the incident occurred.

“It hurts because we don’t know what happened.”

Hadebe said Sanele, 37, was unemployed but he was not a troublesome man.

He said he does not know why they were killed.

“We don’t know what happened but people were killed at the end of the day. It’s not just us. The mortuary van left with six bodies so we are all shocked. Those bodies belonged to people, not animals.”

When TimesLIVE visited the area on Tuesday, the mood was tense in houses surrounding the scene.

People claimed they didn’t know anything or were not around at the time of the incident.

They said the victims would usually sit in the house and smoke.

Bongi Khumalo, who rented a house on the same property as the shooting, said she was shaken by what happened.

She said she was grateful she had been visiting a friend when the incident happened because her house is so close to the crime scene that the police tape marking it extended close to her door.

Detectives from the provincial task team are investigating six counts of murder and two of attempted murder.

TimesLIVE