By Rex Mphisa
THERE was widespread violence throughout Beitbridge on Christmas Day and nurses at Beitbridge hospital were kept on their toes.
The first court day after Christmas was equally busy with the magistrate court reportedly handling more than 30 new cases mostly of violence.
At Lutumba a man identified as Rasta Gandiwa allegedly attacked people with a machete.
He was later arrested and is in custody awaiting trial.
Tsuya Chirasha, one of Rasta’s victims, is lucky to have escaped with what could have easily been a fatal chop.
“He was trying to attack someone when he caught me for going in between them. I did not provoke him, he just attacked me,” said Chirasha exbiting a cut on the neck.
The attack occured well after police had left at around 2 am.
Another youth identified as Philimon said he woke up to see himself at Hospital with a machete injury on his calf.
“I had been having drinks. I just woke up in hospital. I was not involved in the fighting at Lutumba,” he said.
He said he only remembered running from where a fight broke up.
Freeman Muleya said he was attacked by a knife during a fight with a person called Shelton at Siyoka Shops.
“He just pushed me and trouble started. When I retaliated he stabbed me with a knife. He left,” said Muleya.
He was waiting to be X-rayed to determine the state of the stabbing.
A relative to Muleya, one Angeline Mudau, said she was dissapointed when nurses insisted for a police letter before treatment of her cousin who was in pain.
In previous years police maintained heavy presence at business centres where they ordered all shops to close early to contain violent behaviours.
They send away revellers and merry-making people who turned violent in petty fights that degenerate to serious at times fatal assaults.
“There were a few policemen at Lutumba. I remember seeing two young officer who were also having fun and beverages,” said a businessman.
He said by the time violence broke out there was not a single officer in the vicinity.
“Over the last few festives police would order shops to close at 6pm in crime prevention initiatives that paid dividents. But as business people our sales will be low so we are looking at ways we can implement to stopviolence,” he said.
Some nurses at Beitbridge said injured people started trickling to the hospital on Xmas day and there was a steady flow during the day.
A court official said business spilt into the night as rhey handled about 37 new cases mostly from violence on Christmas.
The activity at the courts reflected police had made several arrests.
Thousands of people gathered at shops and almost every business centre had activities with loud music playing and people dressed to kill dancing wildly.
There were many children involved in the township revelling.