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Melody Baya Court Reporter
A 15-YEAR-OLD pupil from Bulawayo’s Njube High School was arrested for brutally stabbing a classmate eight times with an okapi knife.

The juvenile, whose name cannot be disclosed for ethical reasons, viciously attacked Moses Ncube, 18, of Lobengula suburb.

Ncube was hospitalised after the attack which occurred on the schools’ closing day on Wednesday last week.

The court heard the teen had initially assaulted Ncube with a brick during the school term.

The juvenile appeared before provincial magistrate Abednico Ndebele facing attempted murder charges.

Ndebele did not ask him to plead and remanded him in custody to April 7.

The juvenile said Ncube was the aggressor.

“He’s the one who came all the way from Lobengula to where I live in Emakhandeni on closing day. I remember stabbing him in the back, but I don’t recall how many times. He was harassing me that’s why I responded aggressively,” said the juvenile.

“He was assaulting me and I just responded. He even threatened to come to my home, so I decided to act first so that he wouldn’t come home and stress my grandmother.”

Ncube in a warned and cautioned statement said the juvenile almost killed him.

“I was in Emakhandeni visiting friends when I ran into him. He started threatening me saying I didn’t belong to what he said was their ‘hood.’ He then approached me and started assaulting me. He produced a knife stabbed me in the left side of my chest above the heart. He also stabbed me five times in my back and two times in the chest,” said Ncube.

“I sustained deep cuts on my neck, back and chest. I ran away from the accused as I feared for my life. I proceeded to Magwegwe Police Station where they called an ambulance and I was ferried to Mpilo Central Hospital.”

Prosecuting, Steward Madzore told the court that on March 23 at around 11:30PM, Ncube was at Woza Woza shopping centre at Emakhandeni where the teen confronted him.

“Accused was coming from school when he approached the complainant. He held him by the collar and started choking him. After a struggle, accused then grabbed the complainant who then fell down and he produced an okapi knife and stabbed the complainant three times on the left side rib cage and five times in the back before he left him.”

The prosecutor said Ncube was ferried to Mpilo Central Hospital after a police report had been made.