On Wednesday night, the officer, identified only as Constable Marapira, allegedly sent a WhatsApp message to his girlfriend Miss Clarice Sagiya, directing her where to find his body.
Sources close to Cst Marapira, who was stationed at Masvingo Rural Police Station, said he funded Miss Sagiya’s education. She is a final year trainee teacher at Morgenster Teacher’s College.
“The misunderstanding followed Clarice’s decision to dump him on claims that she couldn’t be with a police officer anymore as he wouldn’t afford her upkeep,” said a police officer who preferred anonymity.
The officer responded by killing himself a few metres off the Mvuma-Gweru Road on Wednesday night.
A source said Cst Marapira sent the suicide message at 21:59PM to Miss Sagiya’s Econet line and the message read:
“Vanhu vasanetseke kutsvaga body yangu. Mukasvika paMvuma vanotena ne Gweru road less than a kilometre pane mota pa side pe road chisango to the left (don’t bother yourselves looking for my body.
When you get to Mvuma, turn towards Gweru. Less than a kilometre away, there is a car by the road side to the left.)
About 12 minutes later at 22:11PM, he sent a second message which read:
“Ndafira Clarice Sagiya (I died because of Clarice Sagiya).”
Miss Sagiya allegedly took a phone with the messages to a police station, leading to the location of the body.
A source said: “Marapira impregnated Clarice and after that he paid lobola for her. Furthermore he took her to school and was paying her tuition fees.”
The source said Cst Marapira’s family suspects that he was killed.
Efforts to get a comment from Miss Sagiya were fruitless as a man kept answering her phone and saying he was far from where she was.
Masvingo Province police spokesperson Inspector Charity Mazula said she was away from the station and had not yet received the report.
“Maybe you can contact the station for further details,” she said.
At Masvingo police station, a Sergeant Cripen Gwashu said they had not yet confirmed the matter.
“We’re still dealing with hearsay and are investigating if it indeed happened. At the moment I can’t comment,” he said.
The suicide comes barely two days after a senior officer at Bulawayo’s Westgate Police Station is suspected to have committed suicide by shooting himself.
Chief Inspector Edgar Dube (50), the Officer-in-Charge of the Police Protection Unit at Westgate, used a service pistol to shoot himself on Tuesday morning.
He didn’t leave behind a suicide note but a Bible, opened to Romans Chapter Two, was found beside his body in his blood spattered office.
The first verse reads: “You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgment on someone else, for at whatever point you judge another, you are condemning yourself, because you who pass judgment do the same things.”
A source close to Dube claimed that he was having domestic problems. Others claim he was unhappy after being recently transferred to Bulawayo from Harare.
