By Kuvee Kangueehi Windhoek Magistrate Frikkie Truter yesterday ruled that Lazarus Alferdt Kandara killed himself with his own gun in front of the Windhoek Police Station on August 24, 2005. Truter made this announcement at the inquest into his death at the Katutura Magistrate’s Court and his findings are likely to put to rest the Kandara matter, which had a number of twists and turns since it started almost a year and a half ago. Truter said after studying written evidence from more than 40 witnesses, he concluded that Kandara committed suicide. He noted that through the evidence he learned that Kandara on the fateful night made various phone calls to his wife, friends and Windhoek-based lawyer Gerson Hinda. He added that it also emerged that nobody saw him taking his gun from the wardrobe but his wife testified that he kept his pistol under his t-shirts in the wardrobe. The magistrate said although nobody saw him taking the gun, it was clear that Kandara took and used it. “According to me, the death was not brought about by any act or omission prima facie involving or amounting to an offence on the part of any person,” the magistrate said. He added that the cause of death was a shot wound in the chest, which ruptured the heart. Truter was appointed as the magistrate in the second inquest into the death of Kandara after the previous magistrate Maria Mahalie, who presided over the inquest from March 22 to 27, 2006, was ordered to recuse herself from the case. Mahalie’s recusal was prompted by the fact that she had attended the funeral of Kandara. This move brought an end to the first inquest, which consisted of three-and-a-half days of court proceedings and 12 witnesses’ testimonies. In addition, Mahalie was ordered to pay the costs of the High Court application asking for her recusal from the inquest proceedings. Earlier reports indicated that Truter had ruled that having studied the contents of the police docket on the investigation of Kandara’s death, he was convinced that it would serve no purpose to listen to additional oral evidence before he made his findings. The abortive inquest started last year with a public hearing of testimony from witnesses who saw Kandara in the last hours of his life, as well as from the doctor who performed an autopsy on Kandara’s body. That inquest was stopped after 12 witnesses had already testified. Proceedings before Mahalie were halted when four police officers who had been involved in Kandara’s arrest and the first hours of his detention brought an urgent application to the High Court to ask that the inquest be stopped. The inquest just concluded now ruled that Kandara shot himself in front of the Windhoek Police Station on the night of August 24 , 2005 after he was arrested earlier that day on charges of alleged fraud in connection with the N$30-million Avid-SSC case.