Murder suspect shares strange visions with court

IN the week before he killed a neighbour with a panga, murder suspect Vilho Nghidimbwasha saw strange sights – including people growing ever taller and levitating while their ears grew longer “like donkeys” – and heard voices of people who were pursuing him saying that he should be beaten and killed.

Nghidimbwasha claimed this when he testified in his murder trial in the High Court in Windhoek last week. The trial started before Judge Kato van Niekerk on Monday with Nghidimbwasha pleading not guilty to a charge that he had murdered one of his neighbours, Hofni Johannes, at Uudhiya, a village in the Omuthiya area in the Ondangwa district, on July 13 2003.In a plea explanation that Nghidimbwasha’s defence counsel, Lucia Hamutenya, submitted to the court, Nghidimbwasha admitted that he had inflicted the blow that killed Johannes.Johannes died from a deep cut to the left side of his neck.This wound, it is alleged, was inflicted when Johannes was hit against the neck with a panga.According to Nghidimbwasha’s plea explanation, he thought he was striking at Johannes with a knopkierie – only to realise that in fact he had picked up a panga by mistake and had used this to hit Johannes with.Nghidimbwasha claimed he was under threat from Johannes, who he said had a traditional knife and knopkierie with him, following a “week of threats, harassment and provocation” against him by Johannes and other villagers from the area.All of this happened after he had caught his customary-law wife, Anna Shipala, and Johannes together in bed twice, Nghidimbwasha claimed.Following that, Johannes and other villagers started gathering under a tree near his house each evening for a week, apparently practising occultism, according to Nghidimbwasha’s plea explanation.Nghidimbwasha started testifying in his own defence on Thursday.He repeated his claims that he had found Johannes and Shipala in bed together on two occasions.After the second incident, Shipala left him, taking all her belongings with her, he said.About four days later, Johannes and a group of other people gathered each afternoon under a tree near his house, Nghidimbwasha said.He could hear them calling out to him that he had to go to them so that they could kill him, he told the Judge.Some of them were hitting on the ground with sticks, saying “crush his head, beat him on his head, kill him”, and also “we will kill you today”, Nghidimbwasha related.Except for hearing them making these threats, he could also see the people jumping into the tree, turning their backs to him and showing their buttocks in his direction, “and then their ears became long like donkeys’,” Nghidimbwasha said.He said as he stood at his house, the people at the tree about 40 paces away were becoming taller and taller, while also rising into the air up to the top of the tree, as their ears grew longer like donkeys’.Meanwhile, some of the other people at the tree were continuing to beat on the ground with sticks, saying “kill him, kill him”, he testified.Nghidimbwasha said there were people in the tree for a week.All that time, he was too afraid to cook food for himself or to sleep in his hut.For days he did not eat and only had water to drink, until he was weak with hunger and “that man” – referring to Johannes – was sent “to come and catch me”, because he was powerless by then, he said.Johannes entered his yard and then hit him with a knopkierie on the thigh, Nghidimbwasha claimed.According to Nghidimbwasha he struck back at Johannes with what he thought was a knopkierie – but which was actually a panga.Nghidimbwasha indicated to the Judge that his knopkierie’s handle had a circumference of about three centimetres.The circumference of the panga’s handle was substantially bigger, at some 14 cm.Under cross-examination from State advocate Ed Marondedze, Nghidimbwasha added that when Johannes entered his yard he decided to fight Johannes because he had heard the people at the tree outside saying that he did not have any more power and was weak.”I didn’t kill him on purpose,” he said.Nghidimbwasha was found sitting next to Johannes’s body, which lay on a blanket on the ground, a pillow under his head, the next day.By then Nghidimbwasha had taken off Johannes’s bloody clothing and dressed him in clean clothes, and had also apparently washed the body.Nghidimbwasha explained to Judge Van Niekerk on Friday that he poured the water over the body because – as he saw it – that would neutralise the threats the people outside his house had been making against him.The trial is scheduled to continue on November 26, when a State psychiatrist who has examined Nghidimbwasha’s mental state, Dr Reuben Japhet, is expected to testify.Dr Japhet has found Nghidimbwasha fit to stand trial, but defence lawyer Hamutenya has told the Judge that she wants him to testify on her client’s mental state, as she has noticed indications of paranoia and schizophrenia with him.Nghidimbwasha remains in Police custody in the meantime.The trial started before Judge Kato van Niekerk on Monday with Nghidimbwasha pleading not guilty to a charge that he had murdered one of his neighbours, Hofni Johannes, at Uudhiya, a village in the Omuthiya area in the Ondangwa district, on July 13 2003. In a plea explanation that Nghidimbwasha’s defence counsel, Lucia Hamutenya, submitted to the court, Nghidimbwasha admitted that he had inflicted the blow that killed Johannes. Johannes died from a deep cut to the left side of his neck.This wound, it is alleged, was inflicted when Johannes was hit against the neck with a panga.According to Nghidimbwasha’s plea explanation, he thought he was striking at Johannes with a knopkierie – only to realise that in fact he had picked up a panga by mistake and had used this to hit Johannes with.Nghidimbwasha claimed he was under threat from Johannes, who he said had a traditional knife and knopkierie with him, following a “week of threats, harassment and provocation” against him by Johannes and other villagers from the area.All of this happened after he had caught his customary-law wife, Anna Shipala, and Johannes together in bed twice, Nghidimbwasha claimed.Following that, Johannes and other villagers started gathering under a tree near his house each evening for a week, apparently practising occultism, according to Nghidimbwasha’s plea explanation.Nghidimbwasha started testifying in his own defence on Thursday.He repeated his claims that he had found Johannes and Shipala in bed together on two occasions.After the second incident, Shipala left him, taking all her belongings with her, he said.About four days later, Johannes and a group of other people gathered each afternoon under a tree near his house, Nghidimbwasha said.He could hear them calling out to him that he had to go to them so that they could kill him, he told the Judge.Some of them were hitting on the ground with sticks, saying “crush his head, beat him on his head, kill him”, and also “we will kill you today”, Nghidimbwasha related.Except for hearing them making these threats, he could also see the people jumping into the tree, turning their backs to him and showing their buttocks in his direction, “and then their ears became long like donkeys’,” Nghidimbwasha said.He said as he stood at his house, the people at the tree about 40 paces away were becoming taller and taller, while also rising into the air up to the top of the tree, as their ears grew longer like donkeys’.Meanwhile, some of the other people at the tree were continuing to beat on the ground with sticks, saying “kill him, kill him”, he testified.Nghidimbwasha said there were people in the tree for a week.All that time, he was too afraid to cook food for himself or to sleep in his hut.For days he did not eat and only had water to drink, until he was weak with hunger and “that man” – referring to Johannes – was sent “to come and catch me”, because he was powerless by then, he said.Johannes entered his yard and then hit him with a knopkierie on the thigh, Nghidimbwasha claimed.According to Nghidimbwasha he struck back at Johannes with what he thought was a knopkierie – but which was actually a panga.Nghidimbwasha indicated to the Judge that his knopkierie’s handle had a circumference of about three centimetres.The circumference of the panga’s handle was substantially bigger, at some 14 cm.Under cross-examination from State advocate Ed Marondedze, Nghidimbwasha added that when Johannes entered his yard he decided to fight Johannes because he had heard the people at the tree outside saying that he did not have any more power and was weak.”I didn’t kill him on purpose,” he said.Nghidimbwasha was found sitting next to Johannes’s body, which lay on a blanket on the ground, a pillow under his head, the next day.By then Nghidimbwasha had taken off Johannes’s bloody clothing and dressed him in clean clothes, and had also apparently washed the body.Nghidimbwasha explained to Judge Van Niekerk on Friday that he poured the water over the body because – as he saw it – that would neutralise the threats the people outside his house had been making against him.The trial is scheduled to continue on November 26, when a State psychiatrist who has examined Nghidimbwasha’s mental state, Dr Reuben Japhet, is expected to testify.Dr Japhet has found Nghidimbwasha fit to stand trial, but defence lawyer Hamutenya has told the Judge that she wants him to testify on her client’s mental state, as she has noticed indications of paranoia and schizophrenia with him.Nghidimbwasha remains in Police custody in the meantime.