Oswald Shivute
1 July 2009
AFTER murdering a Police officer at Oshakati State Hospital an 18-year-old man went on a rampage through the hospital on Sunday evening.
The young man, who was subdued only after being shot by Police, has been identified as Matti Mokenzi Bohitile, and is said to be mentally disturbed.
The murdered policeman has been identified as Festus Nghipangelwa.
According to sources at the hospital, Bohitile's murderous rampage started after he allegedly escaped from the hospital's ward seven and went to the casualty ward to watch television.
When he was informed by nurses that the television was not in use, Bohitile became angry and stormed out of the hospital building. Once outside, he started throwing stones at hospital windows and glass doors.
At that stage, casualty nurses called ward seven nurses to come and subdue and collect Bohitile. Nghipangelwa, who was guarding a prisoner in ward seven, arrived on the scene with the nurses from the ward.
It was when the Police officer tried to calm Bohitile down, that he was attacked with a stone and hit against the head and fell to the ground. While Nghipangelwa was unconscious on the ground, according to eyewitnesses, Bohitile picked up a bigger rock and hit him on the head with it until he was dead.
After killing Nghipangelwa, Bohitile took the policeman's service pistol and threw it into the casualty ward, before dragging the deadman's body in front of the casualty ward entrance, where he continued beating the dead body.
When Police arrived, Bohitile was subdued only after being shot twice, once in the head and once in an upper leg.
Bohitile is now being held in the hospital's psychiatric ward under Police guard.
Oshana Police Chief Inspector Karel Theron said the incident is still being investigated.
The casualty ward at Oshakati State Hospital was recently renovated by Namdeb at a cost of N$1 million.
Addressing staff in the wake of Sunday's traumatic incident, Health Minister Richard Kamwi yesterday said, "We have to do our work professionally if we are to save and restore lives, even in difficult situations like this one."
Namdeb's Hilifa Mbako said, although renovations were only recently completed, Namdeb would see what it could do to repair the damage.
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