A FIVE-YEAR-OLD boy was kidnapped and sucked of his blood by “suspected satanists”, a newspaper reported.
Musaope Phiri was grabbed from his grandmother’s home in the Gaza suburb of Chipinge town, allegedly by a man and a woman.
“I was carried to a secluded place some distance away from the house. The two then slit my lower neck using sharp objects and began to suck the blood that was gushing out,” the boy told the Sunday Mail newspaper.
The paper did not say when the incident happened.
Musaope, who bears a large scar on the top left side of his chest, claimed his attackers collected some of his blood in a small container.
His grandmother, Sarudzayi Musona, said she had left the boy in the kitchen while taking an evening shower.
“When I returned after some 20 minutes, I found my grandson gone,” she said.
Musaope said he passed out and only woke up the next morning and managed to walk home.
Doctors at Chipinge General Hospital said he was lucky to be alive after losing a lot of blood.
Chipinge police investigating the incident arrested a nurse who works at the local hospital but later released her after rumours swelled that she was responsible.
The nurse is accused by locals of “amassing considerable wealth through satanic dealings”, the Mail reported.
But she told reporters the rumours were the work of ex-colleagues at the hospital who were angry with her after she reported them for the theft of fuel donated by an NGO. Two employees had lost their jobs, she said.
“On the said date of the abduction, I was down with shigella (a bacterial disease) and have got the necessary documentation to prove that,” she said.
Police are investigating.