School girls collapse in Satanism scare

EIGHT girls attending Monde Primary School just outside Victoria allegedly fainted under mysterious circumstances during a meeting at their "church" founded by a Grade seven pupil at the school.

Parents said they suspect acts of Satanism as the victims, all girls, are members of the church named Christ Authority.

The incident happened on Monday.

It is alleged that the Grade Seven pupil who founded the church was its bishop and she allegedly allocated other pupils positions of pastors, elders, and praise and worship representatives, among others.

School authorities weren't aware of the church until Wednesday when various churches and villagers teamed up to pray for pupils at the school.

Similar incidents have occurred at the school before and no one suspected foul play until Monday when some girls who are members of the "church" collapsed while having a meeting.

At the meeting each pupil was asked to contribute 10 cents towards buying bread in preparation for an all-night prayer they had planned.

The Chronicle visited Monde village yesterday and spoke to parents of the affected pupils as well as school authorities.

Parents said after collapsing, the girls claimed that they were seeing strange things that no one else was seeing. The victims frothed from the mouth and vomited blood while others became weak and temporarily lost sight.

Mrs Patience Sibanda, the mother of one of the pupils who collapsed at school, said she took her daughter for prayers after the incident.

"She collapsed at school and that's when I got to know that she was a member of this so called church and was responsible for preparing holy water," she said.

Monde village head Mrs Sindisiwe Hwata said her daughter who is in Grade Six collapsed outside the school premises after she failed to raise the required 10 cents.

"I think the goblins followed her and attacked her outside the school because she was part of the church and had failed to contribute $0.10. She was the MC for that church but didn't have the money," said Mrs Hwata.

She said as the village head, she had visited the school earlier following reports about pupils collapsing but never suspected they were being attacked by goblins.

Mrs Hwata said the whole community was shocked that a girl had founded a church and coerced other pupils to join, raising suspicion she had initiated them into Satanism.

Mrs Debra Ncube said her daughter who is in Grade Three missed lessons for the whole of February when her stomach got swollen after joining the church.

A troubled Mrs Ncube said she took her daughter for a scan and doctors told her there was nothing wrong with her.

She said her daughter claimed to be seeing some women dancing around her while some strange children were calling her name.

Authorities at the school referred questions to the Ministry of Education, Primary and Secondary Education. Matabeleland Provincial Education Director Mrs Boitathelo Mnguni was not immediately reachable.

Last month Tiki Primary School in Lupane District was closed after teachers sought refuge at a police camp following attacks, some of them sexual, by suspected goblins.

The school is still closed and yesterday authorities invited an inyanga after some prophets popularly known as Wafa Wafa from Tsholotsho failed to exorcise the goblins last week.

Last year teachers at Sibangani Primary School also in Lupane fled from the institution claiming goblins were sexually abusing  them.

Villagers sought the services of Wafa Wafa from Tsholotsho for a cleansing ceremony and the problem stopped.

In 2015, teachers at Siyangaya Primary School in Tsholotsho also fled from the school claiming that a baboon was having sex with them at night.

Another school in the province, Nengasha Primary School in Hwange was also last year affected by suspected goblins and was opened days into the third term.