Husband gone with the census since August 4

A Harare woman on Monday claimed in court that she was meeting her husband for the first time since August when he left for census enumeration and never returned home.

Tambudzai Machakaire had been brought to court by her husband Timothy Matenga who sought a protection order against her. Matenga said Machakaire was his ex-wife who was in the habit of calling him on his mobile phone insulting him.

“Your worship, this woman is causing me emotional distress,” said Matenga.

“She is in the habit of calling me telling me that I live on pills and I won’t live long. I don’t want her to come to my workplace and place of residence as well as calling me.”

But Machakaire told the court that it was, in fact, Matenga who deserted the family going for the 2012 census enumeration in August.

“This man left the family on August 4 going for census enumeration and he did not come back,” she said.

“He left me with no money for rentals and food. He changed his cellphone numbers and I could not even contact him. I tried contacting his relatives and they also said they did not know his whereabouts. I went to Beatrice Kushinga Primary School where he works after our child was injured and they told me that they last saw him during census enumeration.”

When magistrate Ms Miriam Banda asked Matenga to respond to the allegations, he said: “It is true Your Worship, I left home on the 4th of August but this was after several attempts to formalise divorce with her”.

Ms Banda said Matenga did not convince the court why his wife should be barred from visiting his workplace or stop contacting him. Ms Banda granted the protection order in Matenga’s favour and ordered Machakaire to stop verbally insulting her husband.