The family of an 11-year-old boy murdered and molested on election day in New Magwegwe, Bulawayo, was dealt an additional blow yesterday when his body was accidentally handed over to another family, who buried him in Inyanga.
He was supposed to be buried in Bulawayo on Tuesday, but the ceremony has been postponed while the family awaits the retrieval of his bones.
Malibongwe Bright Dube was a Form 1 student at Magwegwe High School. On August 24, the day after the elections, he was discovered dead in his grandmother’s bedroom.
His sister, Princess Monalisa Dube, who was a ZAPU polling agent, said she had left him home alone on the day of the elections.
She returned home on the morning of August 24 to find the door unlocked and the television and laptop missing.
“I panicked as I noticed that we had been robbed. I started calling my young brother but he did not respond, so I ran to call my neighbor. We started searching for him and we only found him in my grandmother’s bedroom. There is a mattress and a big bed, so he was stashed in between,” she narrated.
The postmortem revealed that Malibongwe had been strangled and raped.
His uncle, Qinisela Ndlovu, said the family was devastated by the news.
“We are just confused and pained,” he said. “We wish the world could assist us together with the police so that we can find closure on who killed our nephew.”
The family is now trying to retrieve Malibongwe’s body from Inyanga.
“We have engaged Kingdom Blue to go and ferry him from Inyanga. They left yesterday evening. We have a written agreement that they will pay for the expenses which we had incurred. We are not sure how long it will take for them to come back,” said Godfrey Dube, the deceased’s grandfather.
ZAPU National Organiser Ndodana Moyo said the party is mourning with the family.
“What pains us is that this happened while his sister was defending our vote in Magwegwe,” he said. “We want justice so that these criminals can be arrested and the family find peace.”
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