A bus driver, who allegedly killed his former girlfriend after she dumped him, failed in his application for discharge in the Windhoek High Court last week.
Judge Eileen Rakow found that the suspect has answers to provide.
Victor Elia is accused of killing Iyaloo Ndapandula Hainghumbi, whose body was discovered in a bushy area along the Western Bypass in January 2017.
According to the indictment, Elia, a long-distance bus driver, received a text message from the victim on the morning of 16 January 2017 from her cell phone number informing him that she has a new boyfriend.
At that stage, the victim and Elia had been in an intimate relationship for some time, the indictment read.
This message was sent to Elia after Hainghumbi spent the weekend of 13-15 January 2017 with the new boyfriend who came to visit her from the coast, it is stated.
It is further stated that Elia then met up with the deceased in Windhoek and killed her by kicking and beating her all over her body and head with unknown objects.
After assault, Elia is accused of robbing the victim of her cell phone, handbag, a jacket and a pair of shoes.
He reportedly dumped the body in a bushy area near the Western Bypass.
It is further alleged that Elia then cleaned his vehicle and set alight the belongings of the deceased as well as a headrest from the vehicle with the aim to defeat or obstruct the course of justice.
During the 174 application, the legal representative of Elia informed the court that the State has failed miserably to prove its allegations against the suspect and now wants him to testify to plug their gaping holes.
Mbanga Siyomunji, who is representing Elia on instructions from Legal Aid, told the judge the State has produced no evidence that even remotely suggest that Elia was in the company of the deceased during the time she was murdered.
Rakow, however, said that after weighing all the evidence presented in the State’s case, she found that the State did present a case to the court that should be answered to and that they made out a prima facie case against Elia.
According to her, despite the contradictions in the evidence of the State witnesses, it cannot be said that the evidence does not support any of the charges the accused is facing.
The weight accorded to the evidence would inter alia depend on whether or not it is rebutted by other evidence, the judge said before she dismissed the application.
Elia will return to court on 20 July for the defence case in which he can either testify or remain silent.
Salomon Kanyemba is representing the State.
– rrouth@nepc.com.na