Grade 9, Thlokomelo Drop in Centre
Lunga was a very intelligent boy. He lived in Orlando East. He attended school at Lukholweni in his lower grade and attended Silekele High School in his higher grades. At his lower grades school, all his teachers liked him because he was very clever.
Lunga lived with his mother and his sister. His father was killed at work as he was a police officer and many people did not like him. His mother loved him very much, more than she loved his sister, and believed in him.
As time went by, he went to high school and was in Grade 10 at Silekele High School. He met new friends, and they were a bad influence on him because they were smoking and drinking. By the second term, he was also smoking and drinking. He came home late every day and his mother was starting to be worriedabout him.
He joined a group of gangsters whose rule was, ‘once a gangster, always a gangster.’ They went out at night and mugged people. If anyone started to fight, they would kill them. One night they went out to steal cars. They stole a white BMW and when they went back to steal another one, they got caught by the police. But the magistrate at the Court said that the allegations against them were false because they were too young to steal a car.
Lunga’s mother started to fall sick and Lunga’s sister has to take care of her mother, but Lunga did not take care of anyone. Things started to fall apart at home, but Lunga did not care and he started to stay at his friend’s house. His friend was 25 years old.
As time went on, Lunga did not focus on school work and he failed and had to repeat a grade without his mother knowing about it. His mother and his sister were starving back home, and they were supported by their neighbours. People started to gossip about their situation and Lunga’s behaviour.
One day Lunga decided to go home and he did not like what he saw there. The fridge and cupboard were empty and there was nothing for his mother and sister to eat. They were starving. His sister had dropped out of school to look after their mother because she had no one to look after her.
Lunga wanted to leave the gangster group but he remembered that the rule of gangsterism is that ‘once a gangster, always a gangster,’ meaning that membership of a gang is a life-time. He told his mother that he was now bored with the life he was living and told her what gangsters believe about their life. His mother asked what made him join this gang group and he said he was missing his father and his mother understood the situation he was in. Lunga went back to school. One day at school he told one of his friends that he planned to leave the gang, but his friend decided to tell the whole gang about his plans.
The following day Lunga went to school. He was not happy at all because he had not seen his gang for the whole week, and they would start to suspect something.
When the school was out for the day, his friend tried to stop him from going outside but he did not listen. When he went outside, he saw his friend, and something told him to run away but it was too late for one of the boys in that gang. They pulled the trigger and he ran back to go inside the school. Five bullets hit him in the back of his body. He died immediately at the gate of his school. That’s the death of a school boy.