Sat, 14 Oct 2017 10:16:18 +0000
By Justina Mulenga
A 20-year-old man has been dragged to the Lusaka magistrate court for allegedly defiling his eight-year-old niece.
When the matter came up for trial before senior chief resident magistrate Irene Whishimanga yesterday, the accused pleaded not guilty to the charge of defilement.
Perry Sikazwe, 20, is facing one count of defilement contrary to the laws of Zambia.
It is alleged that on September 6 2017 in Lusaka, Sikazwe had unlawful carnal knowledge of a girl under the age of 16.
The eight-year-old girl told the court that her uncle had been sexually abusing her from the time he came to the house.
According to a statement the victim gave to the police, the accused had been having carnal knowledge of her since he came to the house.
She said every night when her parents had gone to sleep, Sikazwe would sneak in her room to have carnal knowledge of her.
And the victim’s father, Reagan Mweemba testified before the court that he saw his cousin Sikazwe allegedly defiling his daughter.
Mweemba said the accused had been in his house for over three months and suspected that he had been defiling his daughter since then.
Mr Mweemba said he was coming from work around 23: 30 hours when he saw that the light in the children’s bedroom was on and the accused was there and half dressed.
“I went to the bedroom window to check after I saw that the light was on and saw my cousin there in the act, defiling my child. I banged on the window and he came out of the room to open the door for me since I was outside,” he said.
Mr Mweemba said it took time for the accused to open the door as he was pretending to have been eating nshima.
“When he opened the door, I slapped him in the face because he was trying to make a fool out of me by pretending to have been eating nshima when indeed I saw what he was doing to my daughter,” he said.
I further decided to take brutal actions against him but my wife stopped me and advised me to take him back to my mother’s place,” he said.
Mr Mweemba further told the court that he had his three daughters screened the following day at UTH to find out if they were all fine, but found that one of them had been defiled.
He later reported the matter to the police to have the accused person arrested.
The matter has since been adjourned to October 30 2017 for trial.
