The Sunday News
Loveness Mpofu, Sunday News Reporter
A ZIMBABWE Prisons and Correctional Services (ZPCS) officer has been ordered to pay an $80 fine for using abusive language on WhatsApp.
Brighton Chitsa (36) of Chikurubi Maximum Prison Complex sent a WhatsApp message last month to Munyaradzi Mafemera (25), a soldier stationed at Headquarters 1 Brigade in Bulawayo, threatening to make Mafemera lose his job and spend his days in the rural areas watching donkeys mating.
The court heard that his friend Admire Maphosa, had instructed him to send the message. Chitsa pleaded guilty to a charge of using abusive language on cellphone when he appeared before Bulawayo magistrate Mr Franklin Mkhwananzi last week.
In passing sentence, Mr Mkhwananzi exercised leniency saying Chitsa had not wasted the court’s time by pleading guilty and ordered him to pay $80 fine or face 28 days in prison. Chitsa apologised for sending the message adding that he was drunk and was at a bar when he wrote the message.
“I ask the court to help me so that I don’t lose my job and continue supporting my family. My health is not in order,” he said.
Prosecuting, Mr Nkathazo Dlodlo said Chitsa sent the message between 8 and 12 September.
The court heard that the message read: “Be careful not to be caught by a crocodile while packing your fishing implements. You want me to have you dismissed from your job which you so much have trust in and send you to your rural home, so that you see donkeys mating. As it is, I can send people to you, so that they take you and at daybreak, you will find yourself at Harare Remand Prison.” — @lvydvy1
