MASVINGO - A rural couple, stalked by hunger, was recently forced to break into their neighbour’s granary to steal maize to feed their starving children.
They also made away with a goat, a Masvingo court heard yesterday.
The couple, Clifford Mugawa ,34, and his wife Alice Manzunzu, were lucky to escape jail after they pleaded with Masvingo magistrate Oliver Mudzongachiso for lenience. They told the court that they were forced to steal their neighbour’s maize and grain in order to save their children from starvation as hunger tightens its grip in most parts of Masvingo rural.
Mudzongachiso understood the couple’s plight and wholly suspended a one month jail term for the couple. The magistrate fined them $60 each after he convicted them for theft.
Mugawa and his wife did not waste the court’s time and immediately pleaded guilty. They said they committed the crime to save their children from dying.
“Taida kuponesa vana vanga vofa nezhara yangayapinda mumba (We wanted to save our children who were threatened with starvation),” Manzunzu told the court.
Prosecutor Makanaka Chikamhi told the court that on June 26 last year, the couple which resides at plot 19 Boranair Farm in Masvingo East, woke up in the dead of the night and approached their neighbour, Maxwell Mutasa’s homestead on the same farm and broke into his granary.
The husband and wife stole 120kg of maize worth $48 before stealing Mutasa’s goat worth $40.
Mutasa woke up the following night and realised that his granary had been broken into while he was asleep and that one of his she-goats was missing.
He reported the matter to the police leading to investigations and searches on the farm. Mugawa and his wife were found with the maize and were arrested.
Mudzongachiso however, considered the couple’s plea and commutted his sentence to a fine saying the two had done so in a bid to save the life of their minors who had gone for days without having a meal.