In a statement, the police say the vehicle appears to have been stolen on 18 August before it was recovered by Crime Intelligence Gathering members in Selosesha after they acted swiftly upon a tip-off received about the vehicle that was spotted near Sakanyoka.

Earlier, the provincial commissioner, Moeketsi Sempe, told OFM News that following a high incidence of motor vehicle theft and car hijacking, a bilateral agreement was reached between Lesotho and SAPS to curb this. This after a high number of stolen cars from South Africa were taken to the neighbouring Lesotho and stolen cars from Lesotho were then brought inside the county.

"Criminals know no boundaries. You have South Africans committing a crime here, crossing to Lesotho, and similarly, you have criminals from Lesotho crossing [into the country] committing a crime, so they do not know boundaries.”

“So what we are doing as the two countries [is that] we have a bilateral [agreement] and a plan around [it to] conduct operations across the border [called a simultaneous operation] just to deal with the scourge of crime between the two countries, he added.

Sempe further said that the crime involving the two countries is a challenge but they have measures in place to attend to it, especially [following] the recent theft and hijack of motor vehicles.

“From 1 September 2019 we will be putting measures [in place] whereby if one wants to cross to Lesotho with a vehicle you will have to produce evidence regarding the ownership of that vehicle [and] this could be a letter from the bank if it’s still funded by the bank or if you are not the owner of the vehicle, the police will require the affidavit from the owner,” Sempe further said.

OFM News