Mohloai Mpesi
FOR Acting Commissioner of Police, Mahlape Morai, policing was never her first career port of call. But her quest for a good challenge eventually led her into donning the navy-blue uniform.
After completing high school, Dr Morai studied teaching at the National University of Lesotho (NUL), specialising in business education (formerly accounting and commerce).
However, after five years as a teacher, she began to feel idle. It was then that she knew for sure that teaching was not her life’s calling. She felt like she had reached the ceiling. She was looking for something more challenging, invigorating and fulfilling.
Playing for the LMPS netball team while still a teacher, had given her an opportunity to interact with female police officers. It ignited her interest in what they did. Out of interest, she started monitoring their work. She was bowled over.
So in 2002, Dr Morai decided to quit teaching to join the LMPS as a cadet officer.
After completing her training, Dr Morai would spend a good part of her time in the LMPS, as an instructor at the Police Training College (PTC).
From there she was transferred to head the Police Complaints Authority (PCA). She would remain there for a good eight years before re-joining the LMPS’s main operational apparatus.
Daughter of a teacher
Born and raised by a teacher mother in rural Mafeteng district’s Sekameng area, Dr Morai attended Sekameng Primary School where her mother also taught.
“I was raised there. I went to primary school there. It was the school where my mother taught. It is her maiden home. My paternal home is Likhoele Ha-Qobete, but I grew up in Sekameng,” Dr Morai says.
Upon her completion of primary school, Dr Morai proceeded to Morija Girls High School in Maseru where she obtained her Cambridge Overseas School Certificate (COSC).
Following in her mother’s footsteps, she became a teacher after graduating with a bachelor’s degree in Business Education Studies from the National University of Lesotho (NUL).
“I am a business education teacher. I taught for five years after obtaining my bachelor’s degree. I taught business education at Johnson Baker, back then it was accounting and commerce,” she says.
However, five years into her teaching job at Johnson Baker High School, she decided it just was not her calling. In fact, it was not giving her the challenge she craved.
It was at that point in her life, that Dr Morai decided she wanted to switch careers.
“I joined the police service because for me, teaching didn’t have any challenges. For five years I was not challenged. You teach students one thing all the time, it didn’t challenge me.
“It was boring repeating the same thing every year to students. I wanted something challenging and teaching didn’t give me that.”
Taking a different turn
Dr Morai would therefore change gears, joining the LMPS as a cadet in 2002.
“As a teacher for those five years, I knew that I’d had enough with teaching. I had to do something else. In 2001, after graduating with a master’s degree, I realised that I couldn’t teach forever. I knew that I should do something different,” Dr Morai says.
“I then joined the LMPS via a cadet training course in 2002. That means I have been with the LMPS for 22 years.”
She adds: “Back then, when one had university qualifications, they would skip certain police ranks upon completing their cadet training.”
Joining the LMPS via the elite course meant that Dr Morai began her journey in the police service as an Inspector, leapfrogging the lower ranks of Police Constable and Sergeant.
“Cadet training is meant to make you a supervisor when you leave the college. It is not like a recruit course where you start as a Police Constable. After the training we were automatically Inspectors,” she explains.
“I don’t know Police Constable or Sergeant ranks, because at that point, we didn’t even have Lance Sergeant and Sub Inspector. So, I skipped those two ranks.”
Dr Morai had never dreamt of a career in the police force. But she was eventually enticed through her interaction with police officers… Their discipline, neatness and respect lured her into applying to become one of them.
Dr Morai’s proximity to LMPS officers was rooted in her playing for the police netball team. It was during their practice encounters that she developed love for the profession. Realising that she loved the police service, officers whom she regularly had netball training sessions with, encouraged her to apply.
“They told me that there is a programme accommodating graduates, why don’t you apply? Then I applied and I was fortunate to get into the programme. The reasons I am here today are totally different from when I joined the police force,” she says.
After the training, she was deployed to the Police Training College (PTC), where she spent twelve years training recruits.
“After the training programme I was deployed to PTC. Almost all my initial time working in the LMPS, was spent at PTC. I was deployed there. Before we finished the cadet training programme, our programme had what was called an attachment period of four months,” she says.
“For those four months I was attached at Maseru Rural, that time it was at Ha- Mabote Police station. It was just for the purpose of turning theory into practice, like what do you do when you arrest a suspect, when you speak to the public, one’s conduct at the reception, how you approach stock theft cases and all that.”
And while she took a chance in joining the LMPS back then, it was never her ambition to ascend to the helm of the institution.
“The reasons I am here today are totally different from when I joined the police force,” she says.
Achievements
She adds that her dedication and burning desire to serve communities, gave her a purpose in the police service. Her passion has always been to touch the hearts of communities, she says with a smile.
But what of the beatings and torture of suspects that the police service has become synonymous with?
The official line when a suspect dies in police custody, is that they died from fatigue during interrogation.
According to the Transformation Resource Centre (TRC), at least 32 people have died in the hands of police over the years. Autopsies revealed that the victims died due to brutality ranging from torture, gunshots, and assault while handcuffed, the TRC claims.
This is the image Dr Morai says she wants to change. She now devotes her time to changing the narrative about the LMPS. She dreams of a reformed police service that touches the hearts of Basotho.
In recognition of her commendable work, the Intellectual Disability and Autism Lesotho (IDAL) recognised her for her selfless services.
“Last year I was awarded a medal by IDAL, an organisation of people living with mental disabilities. I worked with them and other disability groups for a year. Maybe they gave me the award because of how they felt when I was working with them,” she says.
“It was the first time the LMPS had a disability unit. I pioneered that and reached out to all the groups, and they knew that we were there for them, that we prioritised them. Those with intellectual disabilities, especially girls, are at the risk of sexual violations. But their cases are now being investigated and prosecuted. For the first time they can see that their cases matter and for them, it was something worth commending.”
Dr Morai was given the award after she rejoined the LMPS’s operational ranks from the PCA, which she led for almost nine years from 2013 to 2022.
“If you ask me, I was out of the police service for eight years. I left in 2013 and returned in 2022. Nobody thought I would come back… I was the head of the PCA after all,” she says.
“It was a job that I didn’t apply for. I was transferred there, and I couldn’t say no. I didn’t want it. It was devastating at the time. I went and served for almost nine years. It was a beautiful position but not the work I wanted to do.
“Now I have totally different reasons why I am here. The position that I held at the CPA was a higher paying job than this one. But this one is more fulfilling. It is mentally and physically draining, has big challenges but rewarding and fulfilling at the same time because I serve the society to which I belong.”
Challenges
The “barbaric conduct” of police officers – as described by organisations like the TRC – is one of the major challenges that she feels should be addressed.
Dr Morai says she understands that police officers are going through a lot including workplace challenges that demoralise them. But that must not detract from their mission of policing for the good of the nation.
“When I was at PCA, I would do tours of police posts across Lesotho, just to ask officers how they were doing. I would go to far flung places like Sehonghong. As the oversight body, PCA wanted to enquire about their challenges. It was then that I felt these people really need interventions of some sort.
“When I worked at PTC, I didn’t know the deep challenges that the police had. Mine was to teach them so I didn’t have to travel around their posts.”
She adds: “I understood why the moral of the police service was so low, why they are not motivated? Instead, they are demoralised. Looking at the conditions they worked under, I now have different reasons why I am here, different from when I came in.”
Dr Morai was appointed acting commissioner of police on the 29th of February 2024 for three months. The three months end this month.
She hopes to be confirmed as the substantive Commissioner of Police to fulfil her dreams and for her plans for the LMPS to unfold. She also briefly narrates how she felt when she was appointed.
“Hmm…I don’t know how I felt. I was overwhelmed, with gratitude of course. But honestly, I was not happy. I was not sad either. I didn’t know how I felt. Particularly on that day, the 29th of February (during the sword of command handover ceremony) … I didn’t believe what was happening. It was like a lie,” Dr Morai recounts.
“There would be times when we heard that Ntate Holomo Molibeli was leaving, and you would say “maybe I will be appointed”. I am sure everyone wanted to be appointed. But once you are appointed, it starts hitting hard. You ask yourself how you’re going to cut your own niche.
“I got settled after a week. Right now, I have settled in and understand my role…… It’s not by chance that I got it. I think it was well calculated.”
A highly educated woman, Dr Morai completed her doctorate in Education Management in Comparative Education at the University of the Free State (UoFS) in South Africa in 2010.
She has her work cut out in light of the spiralling violent crime rates. Her honest diagnoses of the problems of the police force and what society as a whole must do to curb crime puts her in good stead to rise to the challenges of her office, if confirmed.
