Zim double amputee: dead man walking

Gift Ncube will forever rue the day in 2013 when he crossed the path of his Mahalapye boss.

Fast-foward to April 8, 2017. Ncube cuts a sorry figure in front of Pick ‘n Pay Supermarket at the upmarket Riverwalk mall in Gaborone.

This is where The Monitor met the young man who sits with two men who sympathetically help him seek donations from passers-by.

The two men play marimba drums to lure the Good Samaritans to take a good look and donate whatever they can into a plastic bowl put on top of a table written "Gift Ncube seeks funds to pay rent and buy food."

With a haunting look, he says begging has become his source of survival. He speaks freely about his failed case, his total abandonment by people and even churches he tries seeking help from.

But most of all, he wishes some of the coins that keep dropping into the bowl would turn into a benefector who would buy him artificial limbs.

This is more so because after losing his limbs, he has become so helpless he just cannot help himself in anyway.

A self-confessed illegal immigrant, he summed up events of his life as it cascaded down a steep incline like a long shadow when the sun  either rises or sets.

"After I lost my case, I lost a lot of things in life. My baby mama left me. I can no longer see my children.

I feel helpless and useless. I feel like a dead man walking because I have to depend on other people for survival. All I ask for is for Good Samaritans out there to buy me artificial hands.

I don't want to be given some money to buy those hands. All I want is to be bought those

hands so that I can go back home and look for a job," he said with teary eyes.

Ncube said since the mother of his two kids left him, life has been unbearable. He said he has had to look for caregivers to help him bath, go to the toilet, cook, clean and do other house chores, but they all left as he failed to pay them.

He said his attempt to seek help from churches ran futile as after a few months, church leaders would tell him that they could no longer assist him because they did not want to get on the wrong side of the Government.

"Even though some people would like to assist me financially, they are scared to do so. Most of them have told me that they couldn't help unless the Botswana government played its part in assisting me.

They feel that since I was an illegal immigrant, they might get into trouble with the law for helping me. This has made life unbearable for me."

"I want to go back to Zimbabwe. Maybe my Government would assist me. Maybe things will be better than being in a foreign country," he said.

He said he has lost hope in the country's legal system after losing his case. He pointed out that even though he was advised to file a compensation case against his former employer, his lawyer had told him that there were low chances  of success looking at the previous case judgement.

"I am tired of being hopeful that I will get justice. I have realised that as long as I am an illegal immigrant I will never find justice in this country," he said tears welling from his eyes.

The state is appealing the case.