Women rapists land Zim man in ICU

By Kitsepile Nyathi

Harare. A Zimbabwean man is seriously ill in hospital after he was allegedly attacked by a gang of three women rapists. The man is believed to be the latest victim of semen hunters who have attacked hitchhikers across the country.

According to the state owned Herald newspaper, the 25-year-old victim was kidnapped by an unidentified man and three women who held him hostage for two days. It is alleged that the man was looking for transport from the eastern border city of Mutare last Wednesday. He was offered a lift by the four, who were travelling in a Mercedes-Benz car.


Police said the male suspect was driving the vehicle while the three women were on the back seat.
The driver stopped at a hotel along the highway and the women bought some drinks.
They allegedly handed one of the cans that had already been opened to the victim.
It is believed the drink was laced with an unknown drug and the man passed out after taking it.
When he regained consciousness, he discovered that he was in a dark room with his cell phone and $200 (Sh320,000) missing, the paper reported.
He was ordered to be intimate with one of the three women by the male suspect, but he refused.
Police say a pistol was produced and the man complied after he was given condoms.
He allegedly had sex with the three women and was released the following day and dumped at a secluded place.
The attackers allegedly took semen from the used condoms.
Police said the man was admitted to a Mutare hospital and has been in the ICU since then.
For the past two years, stories of alleged women rapists, who target hitchhikers on the highways, have dominated Zimbabwe’s media.
The victims include off-duty soldiers and policemen and the women would sometimes allegedly rape the men at gunpoint.Zimbabwe prosecutors earlier this month dropped charges against three women accused of raping male hitchhikers to collect semen for rituals.
Stories of women prowling Zimbabwe’s highways in search of male victims have been circulating for the past few years, and have led many men to take the bus instead of hitchhiking.
Sisters Sophie and Netsai Nhokwara, along with friend Rosemary Chakwizira, were arrested last October after police found 31 used condoms in the trunk of their car while investigating a traffic accident.
The women, all from the city of Gweru, were charged with 17 counts of aggravated indecent assault.  Zimbabwean law doesn’t recognise the act of a woman raping a man.
But DNA tests on the women and alleged victims have exonerated them, their lawyer said.
“The police arrested the wrong people,” Mr Dumisani Mthombeni said. “We have always been saying that and the prosecution was buying time to delay the trial because they knew they lacked any evidence.”
The women had denied the charges, saying they are prostitutes and had been too busy to dispose of the condoms.
Mr Mthombeni said police would prosecute two of the women on prostitution charges, punishable by a fine.
The women, who had been attacked by angry mobs, plan to sue for their “unlawful” arrests and for being paraded on national television as “female rapists,” he said.
Reports in Zimbabwe have described the alarming trend of male hitchhikers being offered lifts, only to be drugged and driven to secluded spots by female attackers