The Sunday News
RECENT revelations that a Eveline High School pupil confessed to being initiated into satanism appear to have opened a can of worms at the girls’ school, amid allegations that yet another pupil last week got into a trance and confessed being part of the cult.
The latest incident comes just a week after it was reported that a school in Midlands province, Melusi Secondary School, was forced to suspend classes following a satanism scare.
Eveline High School sources revealed that the latest incident took place a week after the initial incident with yet another Form Three pupil confessing to being initiated into the cult.
A couple of weeks ago, Sunday News reported that a Form Three pupil at the school had suffered public ridicule from school authorities after she got into a trance when the school head, Mrs Sithabile Moyo, threatened to give the pupil a forced transfer for embarrassing the school.
School sources revealed that in the latest incident, the school immediately requested that the pupil brings her parents to the school so as to help deal with the matter.
“The head (Mrs Moyo) was this time around professional in terms of the way she handled the matter, requesting that the pupil brings her parents to the school but there are now fears that more pupils are part of this cult.
“It is our hope that authorities will move in with zeal this time around and help address this matter before things get out of hand,” said the source.
The source revealed that indiscipline was now rife at the school so much that both teachers and pupils were doing as they pleased within school premises, hence the increase of such incidents.
“Eveline High School is no longer the Eveline people knew, it has now become a highly indisciplined institute. All these satanism cases do not come as a surprise to us because of the state of the school.
“When the story of the initial student confessing to satanism came out in the newspaper, the provincial education office sent in a team of education officers to investigate but the matter was left hanging, we wonder what will happen now that another student has confessed being initiated into the cult,” said the source.
A teacher at the school, who preferred anonymity, alleged there were now factional tensions within the school, with one faction aligned to the school head Mrs Moyo and the other aligned to her deputy Mrs Sihle Ncube.
“The issue is Mrs Ncube acted for some time before Mrs Moyo took over; so as it stands there is a belief Mrs Ncube is sabotaging the head hence all this indiscipline that has suddenly rocked the school.
“A lot of things are happening but it seems nothing is being done to rectify the problems being experienced at the school. However, one thing for certain there is a problem at the school and something has to be done to resolve this problem,” said the teacher.
Efforts to get a comment from Mrs Moyo were, however, fruitless as her mobile phone went unanswered.
Contacted for comment, provincial education director Mr Dan Moyo, however, said his office had not received a formal report on the matter and would wait for the head to submit a report after which they would work on resolving the matter.
“That latest incident has not been brought to my attention, the school head is yet to inform me on the matter but I will send out my officers to investigate the matter,” said Mr Moyo.
Last week, Melusi Secondary School in Silobela under Chief Malisa was forced to suspend classes following a satanism scare which saw pupils mysteriously fainting. The pupils would reportedly fall to the ground and roll while holding their throats as if they were being choked mysteriously.
