TSUMEB – Holding a small toy in his hand nine-year-old Johannes Musenge seems pretty preoccupied as New Era interviews his mother to get information on how he survived a fire that disfigured his face as a baby.
As a week-old baby Johannes was lucky to escape death albeit with a severely disfigured face in a mysterious fire that engulfed his face in flames at a village 60 kilometres outside Rundu.
“I went to take a bath on that fateful day. It was late afternoon and I left my baby in the shack. Of course, I did not think that anything would happen to him since there were no candles or any harmful things in my shack,” recalls Johannes’ mother Elisabeth Ndjamba.
She says after a few minutes in the shower her sister-in-law came running to her screaming that her baby was on fire and that she should immediately come and see. Shocked, she ran over to the shack and found her helpless baby’s face in flames. Very confused and in despair Ndjamba says she did not understand why it happened to her innocent child and why only his face of all places was mysteriously ablaze.
Johannes can use all his five senses although parts have been burnt away such as his nose and his left ear.
“I don’t know how my son caught fire there were no candles or match boxes lying around,” says Ndjamba
She says she rushed him to the hospital and she never thought he would survive. “He was just a week old, never did I think he would make it, but he did. We spent almost two years in hospital. His nose was damaged. There are only two holes through which he breathes and part of his ears,” she says.
As she speaks to New Era, Johannes interrupts her if she has any fact wrong. He has probably heard his mother narrate the painful ordeal many a time.
One of his hands is also burned and when asked how old he is, he flashes nine partly burned little fingers to show his age.
Ndjamba says since they got out of hospital when he was about two years old they started travelling around the country in the hope they would get financial assistance to pay for costly reconstruction surgery.
“We would go around asking for donations, as the doctor we visited told us it would cost around N$20 000 to have a surgery that would improve the facial features of my son,” she said gloomily.
Johannes quickly jumps up to tell us his doctor’s name before he goes back to play.
The boy is school-going age, but Ndjamba says other children bullied him out of school and social workers at the hospital advised her to keep him home until he undergoes reconstructive surgery.
She says they have established a home in Windhoek’s Okahandja park informal settlement
“The other children laugh at him a lot that is why he is not in school, he even tried to drink my ARV tablets one day, perhaps out of frustration,” said the mother.
She says he is not HIV positive and he is the second last of five children. She says – funds available – he could have reconstructive surgery by December.
Members of the public that wish to contribute towards the child’s surgery can contact Ndjamba on her mobile number 0815875113 or use the following bank details Johannes Musenge Bank Windhoek account number: 2000198478 account type savings, Otjiwarongo branch.