Angry members of the farming community stormed the Senekal Magistrate’s Court where Sekwetje Mahlamba and Sekola Matlaletsa made a brief appearance earlier for their alleged involvement in Horner’s murder. 

After searching police cells for the suspects, the situation became tense in the town, where a police van was torched in the unrest. 

Provincial police spokesperson, Thandi Mbambo, says the police reinforcements are coming from Welkom and Bloemfontein. The situation illustrates the farming community’s discontent with police on the issue of farm murders. Frankfort farmer Bernardus Badenhorst tells OFM News farm murders need to be prioritised.

The Frankfort-based farmer says he doesn’t believe the police have made any strides in preventing farm attacks. He says farm murders and attacks, in general, are not considered to be priority crimes and until the government deems them as this, the situation will not improve. He says the first step is acknowledging there is a problem.

Meanwhile, Mahlamba and Matlaletsa will re-appear in the Paul Roux Magistrate’s Court on 16 October. Paul Roux is over 35km away from Senekal. The duo was nabbed on Saturday by Senekal detectives at Fateng-tse-Ntho.

Overall 49 farm murders were recorded during the 2019/20 financial year, an increase of two cases as compared to the previous financial year. The Free State and Eastern Cape constituted 24 of these cases. Murders in the country during the allotted period - between 1 April 2019 and March 2020 - remain high, with a 1.4% increase in 2019/20, to over 21 000 reported cases.

OFM News