BY NOKUTHABA DLAMINI 

A 37-year-old Hwange man has been sentenced to nine years in prison for stealing five cattle belonging to his mother, which he all killed before being caught by the police slaughtering another belonging to another villager.

Chasemore Ngwenya (37) fromMadumabisa  was arraigned before the Hwange Magistrates’ Court facing 2 counts of stock theft.

The National Prosecuting Authority says that sometime in 2019 and at Madumabisa grazing area, the accused stole 5 cattle (3 branded cattle and 2 calves) belonging to his mother.

The total value of the cattle stolen is$1 500 and nothing was recovered.

The offence only came to light on the 4th of November, at around 5PM when the accused was found by the Police at GVZ grazing area skinning another cow.

The value of the stolen property is $450 and nothing was recovered

The accused person was sentenced to 9 years imprisonment on the first count and 9 years imprisonment for the second count.

Both sentences will run concurrently.

He will serve 9 years effectively.

BY NOKUTHABA DLAMINI

An 18-year-old teenager from Victoria Falls has been arrested for suspected murder, where he is accused of murdering his 34-year-old  step father.

The accused, from Chinotimba is now under police custody charged with murdering the man identified as Trust.

According to Matabeleland North police spokesperson Glory Banda, the deceased was found hanging from a 1.8 meters long tree at a Truck Stop area, on November 4, with blood at the back of his head.

The accused allegedly assaulted his step father with a log after being instructed to stop insulting the family and refusing to stop.

The events leading up to the tragedy began when Trust, who was drunk, started insulting the accused’s mother and sister.

The accused asked him to stop, but Trust refused and insulted him as well.

In the heat of the moment, the accused picked up a log and assaulted his step father twice on the head, the limbs and several times on the body.

After the assault, Trust went to a neighbor’s house and reported that he had been assaulted by his son.

The neighbor advised him to sleep in his car to avoid further confrontations.

The next day, Trust’s body was found  by a 14-year-old at 6AM, hanging from a tree at a Truck Stop area.

Banda said he had used the rope extracted from a blanket.

Banda said investigation is ongoing, and the postmortem will reveal whether the cause of death was the assault or the hanging.

BY NOKUTHABA DLAMINI 

Doctor Fungai Musinami, Hange district medical officer, revealed in an interview that Victoria Falls Hospital is not adequately equipped to address mental health issues.

“We do not have a dedicated mental health facility infrastructure or even a drug or substance abuse rehabilitation at the moment,” she said. “But there are projects that are ongoing to try and establish something within the city.”

Despite these challenges, Musinami emphasized that the government is working to prioritize mental health and address the interconnected issue of drug and substance abuse.

“We are working together with drug and substance abuse because these two go together,” she explained.

However, the situation in the whole province is dire.

Out of all the seven district hospitals, none has a facility to handle mental health issues, instead, patients are referred to other institutions in Bulawayo or further.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), Zimbabwe has one of the highest suicide rates in Africa, with 18.4 suicides per 100 000 people.

The WHO notes that mental health issues are often stigmatized in Zimbabwean culture, leading to a lack of seeking help and support.

In the background, Zimbabwe is grappling with a mental health crisis, exacerbated by social and economic factors such as poverty, unemployment, and trauma. Research has shown that these factors contribute significantly to mental health problems in Zimbabwe.

Musinami emphasized that community-based initiatives like the Friendship Bench are making a difference.

“We have trained community health workers for support of mental health,” she said.

“We are looking at scaling that up in the days to come, so that within your wards in the communities, there will be someone trained to do counseling through the Friendship Bench model.”

As Musinami noted that lot of people that end up committing suicide will give hints along the way.