30 Mar 2020

Police have arrested three border jumpers who entered the country from South Africa recently.
Baines Drift Police station commander, Superintendent Onneetse Gagogosha said in an interview that the trio included two men from Mathathane and Moletemane and one South African woman.

He said the three were arrested on different dates after a tip off from some residents of Mathathane and Moletemane.
He added that the first arrest was that of a couple, a Motswana man and South African woman who crossed into the country on March 17 and arrested at Mmanabalala Ward in Mathathane after which they arrested another man on March 27 at Maaloso Ward in Moletemane, who had also entered the country through ungazetted point of entry.

Supt. Gagogosha said the police had observed that border jumpers entered the country through Limpopo River using walls meant to preserve water.
He said the police, together with other security forces, were working round the clock to intensify border patrol, particularly that all the borders in the Bobirwa area had been closed due to COVID-19 outbreak in the neighbouring South Africa and Zimbabwe.

He thanked Moletemane and Mathathane communities for working closely with the police to arrest border jumpers, adding that would prevent transmission of the coronavirus.
He also appealed to Bobirwa community to continue helping the police to arrest border jumpers as they posed serious health hazard to the local community.
Further, he indicated that the trio was handed over to health officials in Bobirwa area where they were sent to a centre Selebi Phikwe for a 14-day mandatory quarantine. BOPA