A Congolose man who had paid for assassins to murder his wife got the shock of his life when she appeared to him after the funeral. Kalala, had told family and friends she was killed in a car crash but what he did not know was that the assassins had refused to carry out  the contract.

“We do not believe in killing women”, they said

Noela Rukundo did not believe when her “kind hearted” would-be assassins told her her own husband had ordered her killing They asked her “You woman, what did you do for this man to pay us to kill you?” They laughed at her when she showed disbelief until they dialed his number and right in front of her, had a full blown conversation with a voice she recognised as her husband’s who confirmed “Kill her”

Noela and her husband were both refugees who had escaped their worn torn countries Congo and Burundi and resettled in Australia. Ironically, the assasins hired by Kalala were former associates of Noela’s brother back in Burundi and had fought in the war together.

They released her but gave a phone which had recordings of their conversations with Kalala as well as receipts of the payment of $7,000 he paid them for the contract – which they kept.

Shaken and shocked, Rukundo made her way to her Pastor’s home and told him everything.  Without alerting Kalala, he helped her return to Melbourne. Together they began plotting her next move. With his help, she contacted and got help from the Kenyan and Belgian who protected her until she confronted him on the day of the funeral.

After getting over the shock of seeing his “dead” wife alive in the flesh, he made a secretly recorded confession to his crime  though he initially denied any involvement.

“Sometimes Devil can come into someone, to do something, but after they do it they start thinking, ‘Why I did that thing?’ later,” he said, as he begged her to forgive him.

On sentencing him to nine years imprisonment, Chief Justice Marilyn Warren said, “Had Ms Rukundo’s kidnappers completed the job, eight children would have lost their mother,”  according to the ABC. “It was premeditated and motivated by unfounded jealousy, anger and a desire to punish Ms. Rukundo.”

But her trials are not yet over. Rukundo told the ABC she’s gotten backlash from Melbourne’s Congolese community for reporting Kalala to the police. Someone left threatening messages for her, and she returned home one day to find her back door broken. She now has eight children to raise alone, and has asked the Department of Human Services to help her find a new place to live.

And lying in bed at night, Kalala’s voice still comes to her: “Kill her, kill her,” she told the BBC. “Every night, I see what was happening in those two days with the kidnappers.”

Despite all that, “I will stand up like a strong woman,” she said. “My situation, my past life? That is gone. I’m starting a new life now.”

Original story: Washington Post

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