adminFreedom Mupanedemo Midlands Correspondent
A MVUMA man brew a shocker when he exhumed the body of his three-week-old baby and dumped it at his mother-in-law’s bedroom hut doorstep.
The man, Talent Majoni, 27, was allegedly driven by suspicions that his infant son’s death had been caused by his mother-in-law whom he suspected of being a witch.
Majoni allegedly surreptitiously followed a group of local elderly women who were burying his late son along a river bed in line with the dictates of local customs which forbid the burial of infants at conventional cemeteries.
He went on to exhume the body soon after the elderly women had left.
Local tradition states that if a baby dies within a month of his or her birth, only a few elderly women in the village go and bury the body at a secret place along a river bed.
Majoni is said to have gone on to exhume the body of the infant before he proceeded to dump it at his mother-in-law’s bedroom hut doorstep.
Majoni, who is from Chirodza Village, Mvuma, accused his mother-in-law, Tapiwa Madzimo, of having caused the death of his new born baby.
Majoni yesterday appeared before Gweru magistrate, Mildred Matuvi, facing a charge of violating a dead body.
Majoni, who is unemployed, pleaded not guilty to the offence and was remanded out of custody on his own cognisance to today for continuation of trial.
For the State, Bernard Nyoni told the court that on 15 October this year, Majoni’s three-week-old baby passed on after a short illness. The court heard that Majoni then confronted his mother-in-law, Madzimo, accusing her of bewitching the baby.
Nyoni said the accused went to the river where the baby was buried by the elderly women in the village and exhumed the body.
The court heard that Majoni took the body and dumped it at Madzimo’s bedroom entrance.
Madzimo went and reported the matter to the police leading to Majoni’s arrest.
Online Reporter
Bongani Ndlovu