The Sunday News
Loveness Mpofu, Sunday News Reporter
A 29-YEAR-OLD man from Nyamandlovu was advised to stop drinking alcohol by the magistrate after he told the court that he does not remember raping his six-year-old stepchild because he was too drunk.
The man had appeared before Bulawayo magistrate Mrs Sibongile Msipa-Marondedze facing a charge of rape and was remanded in custody to 22 November for trial. He pleaded not guilty stating that he did not remember raping the child as he was drunk.
“I do not know if I raped the child or not. It normally happens to me that sometimes I drink too much that in the morning I would not be remembering what would have happened the previous night,” he said.
Mrs Msipa-Marondedze asked him if he was normal before lashing at him.
“So even if you kill someone that means the next day you would have forgotten? Or even if you get home drunk you wouldn’t know where you slept? Let me give you advice, from now on you must stop drinking alcohol because you are facing a serious offence and you don’t even know if you committed it,” she said.
The court was stunned to hear that, the 29-year-old man allegedly applied lotion on the child’s private parts before raping her once in August this year.
It was the State case that the minor’s mother revealed that on 6 August the man arrived home from a beer drink and was served supper. He, however, said it was not enough and demanded some more food. He then asked the minor to accompany him into the forest to look for some eggs.
“They returned after two hours without the eggs. He told me they had gone to a neighbour’s place to collect a solar panel and never went to look for the purported eggs,” she said.
Prosecuting, Miss Concilia Ncube alleged that the man took the child to the forest and applied some lotion on her private parts before raping her once.
“The following day the minor told her mother that she was experiencing pain while passing urine. The minor’s mother asked her what had happened and she revealed that her step-father had raped her,” Miss Ncube said. -@lvydvy1
