Livestock owners tell of chilling threats

Farmers share their fears and frustrations at high-powered crime imbizo

“If you are a daredevil, first dig your own grave, then come out and dare to fight us.

“You will see who will be the last man standing and if your livestock stays in your homestead.”

This, according to terrified livestock owners, is the threat they face from ruthless stock thieves.

Residents of Sulenkama outside Qumbu, a stock theft hotspot, shared their fears and frustrations at an imbizo earlier this week.

The imbizo was attended by community safety MEC Xolile Nqatha, head of department Vuyani Mapolisa, and provincial police commissioner Ltgen Nomthetheleli Mene.

Those present alleged that stock theft gangs worked in cahoots with police officers, who were allegedly paid bribes.

They said if the government was serious about eradicating the scourge of stock theft, they needed to deal with corrupt police officers.

“We lie awake every night fearing that heavily armed stock thieves will pounce again,” one speaker said.

“Police are [allegedly] selling us to the thieves. They are bribed by the thieves.”

Noliso Hluthwa said she lost all her livestock — 18 cattle and 15 goats — in one day in March 2023.

She estimated the financial lost at between R10,000 and R12,000 for a cow and R1,200 a goat. “They left us with nothing. “The investment of many years and all the sweat and blood disappeared in one day,” the shattered mother said.

Police were failing them as a community, she added.

“Even today we have not received feedback from the police. This has left us devastated.”

Nqatha and Mene said it was of great concern that there were police officers accused of colluding with stock thieves.

“The community is telling moving stories on how they are terrorised by the stock thieves while police turn a blind eye,” Nqatha said.

“These are very shocking incidents happening, not only in Sulenkama but the entire Mhlontlo municipal area.”

He said his department and the SAPS were intensifying efforts to deal with crime in the Sulenkama police precinct.

“The provincial commissioner has already opened an inquiry on the allegations made against some of the police officers.

“If we find any rotten element among such members, we will root them out as that behaviour compromises the confidence of the community in the police,” Nqatha said.

Mene reaffirmed their commitment to investigate allegations of corruption, as well as addressing other issues raised by the community.

“I have many questions; I will dig deep on this one.

“Should police be bribed it means the lives of people are not safe. This is worrisome.

“We are going to deploy a provincial team working thoroughly to investigate this,” she said.

Mene pleaded with residents not to create a cycle of crime by taking the law into their own hands.

“We are reviewing the placement of stock theft members to see if they were adequately placed in the hotspot area.

“We will have reshuffling in the stock theft unit. By June, we will be done,” she said.

Nqatha said Sulenkama needed special attention.

“We will provide the necessary support to the police station, deploy safety patrollers who will be working with police, and establish a special stock theft court as we have done in Bhityi and saw the difference,” he said.

Nqatha said that in April, 39 suspects were arrested for stock theft crimes in Sulenkama, which is the policing district with the eighth-highest number of stock theft incidents in the province.