MOKHOTLONG — Advocate Molefi Ntlhoki, the former Attorney General of Lesotho, was arrested last week for allegedly assaulting a man he accused of stealing from his mother.
Ntlhoki was arrested after assaulting Lebohang Komane whom he accused of stealing his mother’s money.
According to the police report Ntlhoki tied Komane with a rope and pulled him with his car.
Komane told the police that Ntlhoki and his companion, Liranyane Maqaleka came to his home and ordered him to get into their car.
Ntlhoki is a respected lawyer who is also part of the commission set up by the Law Society of Lesotho to investigate the crisis in the judiciary system.
He was the attorney general during the Basotho National Party government.
He currently runs his own law firm, Ntlhoki M & Co Attorney. Komane said Ntlhoki and his friend told him that they were taking him to the police.
“When he asked them why they were taking him to the police they said he should wait and see,” the police report said.
He said when he finally got into the car he was surprised when Ntlhoki asked Maqaleka who was driving to take the Thaba-Tseka direction.
“I started wondering why they were going to Thaba-Tseka. I asked them to drop me so that I could walk to the police station,” he told the police.
He told the police that the two men did not answer him.
He said the two then got off the car and locked him inside before disappearing for some time. He said the men came back later with a rope. They drove out of the village.
“When we were out of the village and away from the people, they took me out of the car and started beating (me). They told (me) to confess to having stolen money belonging to Ntlhoki’s mother,” the report said. When he refused to confess, they tied him to the car and drove away, dragging him on a rocky surface. He lost consciousness.
They dropped him outside Janteu village in Mokhotlong where he was discovered by herd boys. He was taken to the hospital where he recovered his consciousness.
In another incident in Mafeteng a 17-year-old boy was killed by two men who accused him of stealing groceries from a local shop. The two men are alleged to have used a horse to drag him to force him to confess to the alleged crime.
According to the police report the men had been sent by the chief to fetch the boy and other suspects from the school for a disciplinary hearing but the principal refused saying she could not release him to unknown people.
They captured him on his way home from school. They fastened him on the hooves and dragged him to the chief’s place.
He died from the injuries, the report said.
