The Murewa community has welcomed the death sentence imposed on Tafadzwa Shamba and Tapiwa Makore Senior for the brutal murder of Tapiwa Makore Junior in 2020.

Nyamutumbu Village in Murewa is just a few kilometres from Harare and this is where the innocent soul was brutally murdered for ritual purposes three years ago.

Tapiwa Makore Junior’s murder touched the hearts of many as he died at the hands of people he trusted the most.

To make matters worse, his namesake Tapiwa Senior was the one who held his legs while Shamba slit his throat without mercy.

The sentence handed down at the High Court this Wednesday brought relief to the Nyamutumbu community which has been waiting for justice to be served.

“I welcome the development and the government has done the wonderful thing. I am so excited that justice has been served today. I have no regret about those two. The sentence has brought relief and all the time I was blaming the government but today that I’m grateful that justice has been served. When Tapiwa was murdered I was traumatized, and I spent more than six months in bed but today am happy. What Tapiwa Makore Senior did is unforgivable,” expressed one of the Murewa community members.

” The sentence has brought relief to us because, since the day we had that the body parts of Tapiwa Makore Junior were found mauled by dogs, it was our prayer that one day the perpetrators be brought to book,” said another community member.

The garden which Tapiwa Junior was looking after on the fateful day has been abandoned with no one taking care of it.

Another Murehwa community member said, “Since I was born this is my first time to hear such things. It’s so sad that someone can kill a person like he is killing a cow, so we are happy with the sentence. Tapiwa and Tafadzwa must also die the same way or rot in jail.”

“We were equally expecting the high court to hand such a sentence because if they are killed, we don’t mind because they killed an innocent child and they deserve to die,” noted a community member.

Tapiwa Junior was seven years old and in Grade One at Nyamutumbu Primary School when he cruelly met his fate.

School officials and Tapiwa’s friends preferred to speak off-camera as they are still suffering from trauma.

Tapiwa Makore Junior was buried here in Murewa in 2021, a year after he was brutally murdered. It remains a mystery that his killers are not willing to reveal the whereabouts of his decapitated head, protecting the traditional healer who ought to have been with them in the dock.-ZBC News