It's been 10 years since music icon Taliep Petersen was brutally murdered, and his children say they are only now starting to pick up the pieces.
Tied up on the floor and pleading for his life, Taliep was shot dead execution-style in his house on December 16, 2006.
His wife Najwa Dirk was convicted of his murder in the Cape High Court on December 2, 2008.
For the first time on Friday, the slain musician’s daughter Jawaahier Petersen broke the silence on the family’s pain following her dad’s death.
In an interview with Voice of the Cape Radio, she said: “It’s like he was kept alive to us by the constant discussion around the nature of his death.
“Najwa was sentenced in 2009 and thereafter we could breathe and close the chapter and find our way forward. It was incredibly difficult.”
Najwa is currently serving 28 years in prison for the murder.
Jawaahier said they also had to adjust from a life of comfort to one of financial difficulty as her dad’s assets were frozen during the murder investigation.
When school started in January, there was “no money to pay for school fees and university”.
She says on the day her father died, they went to Canal Walk and he gave each of them “a directed speech”, making them promise to always be there for each other.
“Looking back now, that should’ve been our sign that something would happen to him. And that is what carried us through this,” she adds.