ELEVEN school children, who were savagely assaulted by some overzealous security guards for allegedly stealing sugarcane from Green Fuel fields, are suing the ethanol producing company and its sentries for more than US$100 000 in damages.
The parents and guardians of 11 school children, who are aged between 13 years and 17 years, enlisted the services of human rights lawyers Tatenda Sigauke and Peggy Tavagadza of Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights, who on Friday 22 August 2025 filed summons at Chipinge Magistrates Court against three security guards and Green Fuel, an ethanol producing company, which runs operations in Chisumbanje in Manicaland province, demanding payment of damages amounting to US$110 000 arising from the unlawful assault and ill-treatment perpetrated against them.
The school children were assaulted by Green Fuel security guards namely Makina Ngwenya, Benjamin Dube and Munorwei Gomondera, who were acting in the course and scope of their employment as security personnel with Green Fuel, sometime early this year, who accused them of stealing sugarcane from the ethanol producing company’s fields, while on their way from Katanga Secondary School in Chipinge in Manicaland province.
According to Sigauke and Tavagadza, the security guards ordered the school children to lie down on their bellies and used a switch to flog them several times on their backsides and all over their bodies.
Gomondera reportedly recorded videos of the assault and the videos later went viral on various social media platforms.
The lawyers charged that the school children sustained injuries from the assault and experienced swollen backsides and were not able to walk properly for some time.
As a result of the savage assault, Sigauke and Tavagadza said the school children experienced shock, pain and suffering, both physical and psychological, emotional trauma and distress, contumelia and suffered public humiliation while their dignity and bodily integrity was violated.
According to the lawyers, the assault was grievous and psychologically traumatising due to the students’ young ages and the viral effect of the videos, which circulated on online platforms.
Sigauke and Tavagadza want the court to order Ngwenya, Dube, Gomondera and Green Fuel to pay a total of US$110 000, which entails payment of US$10 000 to each student, for damages for pain and suffering, shock, trauma, contumelia and violation of dignity.
In addition, the human rights lawyers want the court to order Green Fuel to issue a public apology to the students, their parents, their guardians and the community of Chisumbanje and to denounce the illegal conduct of its security guards as unacceptable, unjustified and contrary to the respect owed to members of the community and to commit to taking all necessary measures to ensure that such despicable acts do not recur.
The apology, the lawyers said, should be published in a newspaper circulating within Manicaland province and should also be broadcast on Vemuganga Community Radio once every day for five days and on Green Fuel’s social media platforms and company notice boards for a continuous period of 14 days.
ENDS
Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights
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No. 103 Sam Nujoma Street, Harare, Zimbabwe
Phone: (+263 8677005347, +263 242 764085/705370/708118
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