2 Lebanese arrested for malicious damage

Police on Tuesday arrested two nationals of Lebanon for allegedly raiding Paramount International Academy in Lilongwe and damaging property besides assaulting the school’s head teacher.

Lilongwe Police Station spokesperson Hastings Chigalu said in an interview on Wednesday that Ahanad Alalli, 21, and his mother Najah Jawad, 38, were arrested due to their violent reaction to a report that their child was involved in a fight at the school.

“We have opened a case of malicious damage and they will be taken to court soon to answer that charge,” he said.

The school’s head teacher George Phiri yesterday confirmed that two students picked a fight just before noon.

He said: “It all began just before the knocking of time at 12pm, when two boys were in the toilet and another boy entered. Then the other boy wanted to give a hand shake to one of the boys he had found, but he was denied this handshake.

“The boy who denied the handshake called the other boy a frog and then said ‘do you want to fight’ and the fight began. And the two boys began fighting the other boy.”

One of the parents, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the child reported the matter to her parents and on Tuesday the child’s mother went to the school to get more details, but she allegedly turned violent and started assaulting the head teacher.

According to the source, the irate couple called four other Lebanese who arrived at the scene to assist them, but the police responded swiftly and controlled the situation.

Concerned parents of wards at the school have since written the school to expel the Lebanese child and never allow anyone connected to that particular family around the school premises.

Reads the petition in part: “The perpetrators of this violence had no or little concern how their conduct would affect other pupils and their parents some of whom witnessed the violence.

“Such actions have come with a sense of shock and deeply traumatised our children considering the degree of violence caused in comparison to the incident that may have ensued as child play among pupils.”

Phiri said Paramount International Academy will issue a press statement on the matter.