Durban - A Chatsworth schoolboy faces the prospect of being paralysed from the waist down after two bullies used a dangerous manoeuvre copied from a popular TV wrestling show, and drove his head into the ground.
Zhain Abu-Baker, 18, has been in hospital for more than a week and was due to undergo a spine operation on Wednesday, which would determine if he will be able to walk again.
He said he was attacked three times last Monday by a pair of school pupils who unleashed a flurry of blows to his face and kicks to the torso that had left him dazed and out of breath.
In the last attack he was subjected to a wrestling move known as the “Tombstone Piledriver”, which was made popular by The Undertaker, a professional wrestler from WWE.
But the ground was not a yielding canvas, it was concrete paving.
The Grade 11 Marklands Secondary School pupil recalled the incident from his hospital bed, saying he had no idea why they singled him out for attack.
“I have been lying on this bed for the past week, trying to remember if I had somehow offended them,” he said.
“I could see trouble was written all over their faces when they were approaching me, but I wasn’t too concerned about it because I knew I hadn’t done anything to them.”
Abu-Baker said the two were notorious for bullying and assaulting other schoolchildren.
The attacks on him started outside a classroom, and then moved to the assembly area after he was chased around the school.
“A friend of mine came to intervene and I thought that was the end of it,” he said. “I was then attacked after school.”
He said his attackers taunted him and “that’s when they started toying with me and doing some wrestling moves and the last thing I remember was being upside down and being subjected to the ‘Tombstone Piledriver’ on the concrete (paving)”.
He said that was when he lost consciousness and remembered waking up with pain in his back and neck.
The piledriver was one of the most dangerous wrestling moves and had been banned by many associations and federations across the world, said Kobus Erasmus, of the African Punishment Wrestling Association.
“The impact of the piledriver is so bad, a person might end up with a cracked skull, a broken neck or even die as a result of it,” he said.
“You have to understand that the move requires someone to be upside down, with their head between someone’s thighs, and being dropped on their head, with the weight of his body resting on it (the head). It’s very dangerous and we don’t recommend it at all.”
Erasmus was shocked by the Chatsworth incident and could not believe that such a dangerous manoeuvre had been performed by schoolchildren with the intention to hurt each other.
Abu-Baker’s grandfather, Bobby Moodley, said his grandson sustained serious injuries that include fractured fourth and fifth vertebrae and might end up being paralysed from the waist down.
“The doctor told us he might not be able to walk after the operation,” Moodley said. “I just want to know what the school is going to do about the boys who attacked him because we know nothing has been done and they haven’t been suspended.
“We opened the (criminal) case against the boys who injured Zhain and we hope something will be done to make sure they learn their lesson.”
Moodley said he was heartbroken when he saw Zhain in an induced coma for two days because of the excruciating pain he was experiencing.
Police spokesman, Captain Thulani Zwane, confirmed that a case of common assault had been lodged and that police were investigatingr.
Marklands principal, Anwar Khan, said the matter was also under investigation and would be tabled before a school tribunal.
“We have set up the necessary operations to make sure this matter is resolved,” Khan said.
Muzi Mahlambi, spokesman for the KZN Department of Education, said the school would have to deal with the matter.
“We condemn any form of violence at schools especially bullying, no matter how passive it may be,” he said.
“We want the parents, teachers, and students to play an active role in ensuring these kinds of acts are brought to an end.”
Mahlambi said it was the responsibility of pupils and parents to uphold the code of conduct at schools.
Tim Gordon, of the School Governing Body Forum, said schools should do more to avoid bullying.
“Schools have to take the precaution to guarantee that bullying or violence does not exist within a learning environment,” he said.
“If such an incident occurs, the school needs to provide support to the affected student and take action against the perpetrator. However, precaution needs to be taken because there may be underlying factors that the school is not aware of. The (perpetrators) might be bullied at home or might be abused.”
In January, a survey conducted by research company Pondering Panda revealed that one out of two children stood a chance of being bullied.
Pupils from more than 2 000 schools across the country participated in the survey, which found that more than 50 percent admitted to being bullied while 68 percent expressed concern about being physically assaulted or threatened with a weapon at school.
More than 50 percent of pupils interviewed in KwaZulu-Natal admitted to being verbally abused by other pupils while more than 25 percent admitted to having been physically bullied.
A recent National School Violence Study revealed that one in five South African secondary school pupils is a victim of bullying, including assault, robbery, and cyber bullying.
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