In a peculiar twist of events during the festive season, a 26-year-old Police Officer based at Borakanelo Police Station in Gaborone left the staff at Francistown’s Nyangabwe Referral Hospital in bafflement after he sneaked out of the hospital and escaped into the nearby bushes where he committed suicide before he could be attended for medical attention after an accident. Speaking to The Sunday Standard, the Senior Superintendent of Central Police Station in Francistown, Chabaisile Kesupetswe, confirmed that the Police Officer who hails from Kgari Village in the North East District had encountered a car accident together with his father near Tshesebe Village.
“The deceased, who was travelling with his father in the vehicle, had suffered minor injuries and after they were whisked to Nyangabwe Referral Hospital, the man escaped from the hospital into the dark of the night where he was later found hanging from a tree after a thorough search by police and was later certified dead,” Kesupetswe said.
The Station Commander pointed out that after the accident occurred in Tshesebe Village, the deceased at one point attempted to escape but could not succeed.
Kesupetswe added that the cause of the accident could not have been intentional as many may assume because the car tyres showed that there was some air leakage which could have resulted in the accident.
He said that the motive behind the man taking his life is still a mystery as the police are still conducting their investigations.
The Public Relations Officer at Nyangabgwe Referral Hospital, Chris Habana, also confirmed to the Sunday Standard in a telephone interview that indeed the man was brought in an ambulance, and just before he could be admitted, he escaped from the vehicle and jumped the hospital fence into the dark.
Sunday Standard is further informed that the deceased visited his cousin who stays in Extension location of Francistown and asked for a wire to go and fix his car, which he alleged had a break down. The unsuspicious cousin then offered the wire, which he used to hang himself.
The father to the deceased was later discharged from hospital.
In yet another odd incident, an 84-year-old mentally disturbed woman of Tutume Sub district was also found dead after disappearing for two days during the Christmas holidays.
Senior Superintendent Kesupetswe said that the woman was found in the nearby bushes of Tutume Village from where she was ferried to the Tutume Primary Hospital where a doctor certified her dead upon arrival.
Kesupetswe conceded that the police had not yet been able to establish the cause of death, adding that investigations were still ongoing.
However, touching on the rate of crime during the recent festive season, Kesupetswe pointed out that there had been a significant improvement in the Northern Region with regard to crime and road accidents as compared to the previous years.
He said that although the borders between Zimbabwe and Botswana were congested with foreign nationals returning into the country from the festive celebrations, everything was peaceful and was manageable.
