#HopeZinde found dead in car boot, son held

Businesswoman Hope Zinde's body was found in the boot of her car, and her son - who did not seem "amused or shocked" at the discovery - has been taken in for questioning.

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Johannesburg - Flamboyant businesswoman and former SABC board member Hope Zinde, 50, was found murdered in the North West Province on Saturday and her son has been taken in for questioning.

According to North West police spokesman Colonel Sabata Mokgwabone, the former radio and television personality was found dead in the boot of her car at Pecanwood Estate near Hartbeespoort Dam on Saturday afternoon.

Police said her 28-year-old son was later arrested at the upmarket estate.

A policeman at the murder scene who asked not to be identified said she appeared to have been killed earlier in the week.

“It was bad. It seems she was murdered on Monday or Tuesday,” he said.

Mokgwabone could not give more information on how Zinde died, but said a murder case was being investigated and the son was a suspect.

Another officer, who was among the first people on the scene, said the son did not seem “amused or shocked” when they found his mother’s body in the car boot.

It is understood a family friend had been trying since Wednesday to contact Zinde. When he went to her house on Saturday morning to investigate, he saw Zinde’s son peeping through the curtains, refusing to open the front door.

He then allegedly alerted the Pecanwood security and the police. When the police arrived at the house the son opened the front door. The police noticed bloody marks leading from the bathroom to the garage.

Zinde’s body was found in the boot of her luxurious SUV car. A bloodied 10kg weight was found in the bathroom.

Mokgwabone said a large amount of drugs was found in the house.

Zinde, an erstwhile anchor for SABC Africa before becoming a non-executive director of the public broadcaster, was an executive manager at the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (Prasa) at the time of her death.

The SABC board fired her in March last year following a special meeting at which they passed a vote of no confidence in her.

The meeting was convened to deal with matters relating to the conduct of certain board members in the light of allegations including fraudulent conduct, raising matters of the board externally without a mandate, as well as a non-disclosure of a conflict of interest.

Zinde had been an executive producer and anchor for SABC Africa since 2000. She was at the same time head of Hope Zinde Communications, which she set up in 1998.

She started her journalism career in 1991 as a newsreader, was promoted to writer, producer anchor of various current affairs programmes and involved in various freelance journalism projects. She previously served as corporate affairs senior manager at Ford Motors. .

She also served as a non-executive director of Pan-African Capital Holdings (Pty) Ltd. She had a honours degree in psychology.

Sunday Independent