Kgafela flees...

BAME PIET
Staff Writer | Thursday October 28, 2010 00:00

 

Last May, he and his younger brother, Mmusi, made the police wanted list after they failed to appear before former Regional Magistrate Lot Moroka, who has since been appointed to the High Court bench.

Kgosi Kgafela's disappearance followed a ruling by Regional Magistrate Barnabas Nyamadzabo yesterday committing he and 13 others to custody for 14 days in the case in which the 14 are charged with unlawfully wounding several people in Kgatleng by flogging them between December 2009 and April 2010.

Kgosi Kgafela left the court under a heavy escort provided by a group of unidentified men presumed to be members of mephato (regiments). He boarded a silver blue Toyota Camry sedan with registration numbers B747ALB and headed in a westerly direction from the Village in Gaborone.

The Bakgatla sovereign disappeared under the noses of police officers who were eager to convey him to custody. Some of the men who escorted the Bakgatla Paramount were heard urging: 'Tsenang mo dikoloing re tsamae re ye Mochudi!' 

A machete wielding man clad in mophato attire said menacingly: 'Batho ba ba a tshameka. Ga ba ise ba bone batho ba bolaiwa ba le bantsi. (These people want to witness bloodletting)'. It was not clear to whom his words were directed.

Some people later claimed that Kgosi Kgafela boarded a truck full of regiments and headed for Mochudi. The truck was reportedly parked among other vehicles in the residential neighbourhood near the courts.

Outside the courtroom, unidentified men stated loudly that their Kgosi was going to Mochudi and not to jail. In what turned out to be a decoy, they directed him to a Camry parked on the side of the road, temporarily blocking traffic to allow the car to reverse before hitting the tarmac. In the ensuing melee, an exasperated police officer enquired from a colleague: 'Mapodisi a kae ne banna? (Where are the police?)'

All this drama was to put defence attorney Unity Dow in an invidious position as she attempted to explain the whereabouts of her clients.  Whereupon Inspector Moses Makgoeng told the court that they were just about to arrest the Kgosi when they learned that he had already left in an unidentified vehicle.

STOP PRESS*At the time of going to press, unconfirmed reports reaching Mmegi were that Kgosi Kgafela had been jettisoned across the border into South Africa. MONKAGEDI GAOTLHOBOGWE reports that he learnt this from a man who said he drove the car that carried the Bakgatla sovereign from the court.

*However, a plainclothes officer told our reporter that a police helicopter had followed the car carrying Kgosi Kgafela to the Kgotla in Mochudi.

*There was confusion at the Kgotla where agitated Bakgatla gathered. By sundown, no one had addressed them, but Kgafela's younger brother Bakgatle was expected to do so.

*Journalists and the police - including known DIS agents - were barred from the Kgotla.

*However Mochudi Station Commander Superintendent Onneetse Gagogosha told Mmegi late yesterday that Kgafela and company had still not been arrested, adding that the police hoped to arrest the men soon.