16 Jul 2013

Police in and around Gaborone have reported a peaceful and quiet President’s Day holidays.

This year, the police replaced normal road blocks with a series of sporadic road blocks in most of the internal roads and highways in and around Gaborone where a number of motorists were snatched for various traffic offences.  

Sergeant Isaac Ringa of Old Naledi  said on July 15 that during one of the sporadic road blocks along the Gaborone/Lobatse highway that motorists were cooperative even though over speeding was still a major challenge. He said the highest speed they recorded on an area of 80 km/h was that of 164km/h for which the driver was fined P1 780.

Sergeant Ringa decried animals particularly cattle from nearby farms that were roaming the roads day and night.  He appealed to farm owners to mend their farm fences and close gates to prevent cattle from going out of the farms.

At another sporadic road block, Constable Abel Kooreke of Ramotswa police station said they only mounted one road two days before the President holidays. He said the purpose of the road block, which was removed on July 14, was educational road traffic campaigns to sensitise motorists on road safety issues.

In Gaborone West policing area, police nabbed close to 40 motorists for offences that included driving without a driver’s license and driving under the influence of alcohol.

Superintendent Agreement Mapeu said apart from road traffic violations, a middle aged man was in police custody to assist the police with the death of a middle-aged man who was found dead near Red Dot Bars in Block Six in the early hours of Saturday.

He said preliminary investigations revealed that the man might have been knocked down by a hit a run vehicle.

Superintendent Mapeu said the suspect claimed that he found the deceased lying on the road. Superintendent Mapeu said it would only be after the post mortem when the police would know what caused the death of the deceased.

In another incident, he said they were holding a Zimbabwean national in connection with a robbery that took place in Block Six on the night of July 13 by four men whilst the victims were having celebration.

He said the four suspects robbed the victims of four cellphones and some expensive jewellery of an undisclosed amount before they sped away in their get-away vehicle.

He said as the robbers sped off, the victims gave chase and knocked their vehicle on the side until it lost control near Bonnington School. He said three other robbers managed to escape whilst one, who was arrested. Superintendent Mapeu said the three are still at large but the police are optimistic that they will ultimately arrest them.

In Old Naledi, the Acting Station Commander Assistant Superintendent Mavis Mothibedi said she did not record any fatal road accidents in her policing area during the holidays apart from various road traffic violation offences.

She said they recorded one case of break-in in which a cooking gas was stolen in one of the houses whilst the owner was reportedly away. Ends