Everybody knows Enoch
WRITER ROBERT MUKONDIWA relives his memories living in the same village as self-confessed murderer Enoch Potani who murdered then raped Catholic Nun Sister Clare Ruvadiki Plaxedes Kamundiya and the deterioration of his mental state until the heinous crime. I know Enoch. Long before he bludgeoned a Catholic nun and dragged her lifeless body across the brittle Mutoko grass, tore her clothes off and raped her unconscious body and then went on to carry her from place to place, I knew Enoch. Before he noticed that the ‘‘corpse’’ was in fact an unconscious woman and went on to further beat her until she lay lifeless and then raped her cold corpse again before carrying her around on his bicycle, I knew Enoch. He was that eccentric young man in the village who would visit my family home every day to fetch clean water as did everyone in the village at one time or another. He had thick, round thigh that would be squeezed into the black gumboots that he wore, his light skin made even lighter by contrast between his skin and his wellies. His arms were like those of Bison and spoke an unspoken gospel of a mighty young man beneath the rippling muscle. He was fearsome. Not least of all because we all could tell he was mentally challenged and knew his battle with mental illness. The monthly trip to the hospital at Mutoko Centre for his injection, but also because his eyes told a dark tale. I knew Enoch. I warned the young fresh women in the village who came to the well to not encourage him. They teased him and said he was not ‘‘man enough for them’’ and would run around like excitable wenches as he ran around the garden pursuing them to show them he was really a man. “The problem is Enoch is a man and like any man has his needs and that smell of oestrogen in the winter sun excites him as it does any other man; prodding him is dangerous because one day God forbid he will be overpowered by that spirit, that haunt within him and force himself upon one woman, or even child,” I had warned. The girls had heeded and ceased to tease him. I knew Enoch.
And never talked to him. Any show of friendliness would see him become overly familiar and familiarity breeds contempt. He thought I was strict, no nonsense and scary. The truth is every time beneath that bluff of strength, I would be shaking inside like a little girl. Seconds from cracking. Because I knew he was not getting his medication and with every passing day the human in him was slowly closing shop and like a werewolf facing the moon he was taking on a new, dark, deadly form.
It was not him. He ought not to have been subjected to stigma. It was society failing to help him.
He would rage often. He would ferry 80 litres of water in a wheelbarrow and push it uphill to his homestead. It is a task no one can emulate with their human power. But he would do so effortlessly.
Then he would get to the top of the hill and pour all the water onto the ground and return for more. He could do so up to five times until I stepped in and strictly said he was no longer welcome. He would squint his eyes and show an inner anger. His angry soul would look directly into my hiding cowardly soul then in the spirit world he would threaten me before leaving. I knew Enoch. He could on the morrow be very pleasant and stretch his hand demanding a sip of your ‘‘Super’’ opaque beer. I never gave him. We were not buddies. But strangers. Because if you have lived with mental illness in the family you know how this story ends if a person doesn’t get help. It ends badly.
Enoch Potani was a crime, a tragedy, a disaster waiting to happen. When he eventually left the human settlement and started living on three different mountains, there began the unholy trinity of shrines that he created.
It was from one of these that he observed sister Ruvadiki and talked to her. He won her calm. Then he attacked her and did the unthinkable. In a nation that hardly funds mental health care, there is a serious epidemic where we sit on our cerebral challenges or those of our loved ones and think it will all go away.
We blame spirits and demons and tete, but never confront the elephant in the room. Some commit suicide, or harm others and in cases such as those of Enoch, the tragedy that could have otherwise have been avoided, is what it takes to commit someone where they cannot hurt others but it is almost too little too late. Everybody knows an Enoch. A man, woman or child who needs help with mental illness. Who is crying for help as they are tormented by something that can be contained.
When they are overpowered they become a demon, but the truth is they were a wailing soul that was never attended to in time. I know Enoch. You know Enoch. Everybody knows Enoch.