Photo: For illustration purpose only

A 60-year-old Chiredzi security guard was allegedly murdered by unknown assailants who decapitated his head and threw the body in a bonfire in an incident that shook the sugar cane growing community on Sunday.

The chopped head of Lazawa Salani of Buffalo Range was found by a search party comprising the police and ordinary people buried in a small shallow pit about 1,5km from an open space near the Chiredzi Magistrates’ Court where the deceased guarded.

Salani was employed at Maria Mabasa Plastic Scrap Collection Company in the town and police recovered his blood-stained uniforms and trails of blood on some bales of plastic scrap he guarded.

Masvingo police spokesperson Inspector Kudakwashe Dhewa today said police investigators found some of Salawi’s remains burning in a smoldering bonfire that had been set by his suspected killers at his workplace.

His remains were taken to Chiredzi District Hospital for a post mortem.

Police were still looking for leads to establish the motive of the grisly murder and the suspects. -The Herald