Tonota farmer moo-dy over butchered cows
A Tonota farmer is hopping mad after thieves butchered four of his cows at Makomoto lands over the weekend.
The irate man, Meshack Senwamadi, who asked for his picture not to be taken, was in Gaborone at the time of his cattle’s slaughter, only returning to TNT on Monday morning.
The bandits, described as two young men, were rumbled by a passerby at around 4pm on Saturday afternoon, caught in the process of skinning one of the dead cows. They bolted the crime-scene and have not been seen since.
“I received a call from the police informing me about my cattle when I was in Gaborone. I asked my relatives to attend them and they swiftly did so. Unfortunately, the cows were in a bad state that nothing could be done with them,” grumbled Senwamadi, 53, adding losing four cows was extremely painful.
“It is a big loss and a sad thing to me as a farmer. At the scene they found two cattle’s heads without the rest of their bodies. The other two cows were slaughtered in half; snares were used to trap them and prevent them from escaping,” he continued, noting the animals were found in a bushy field opposite his farm.
Senwamadi further told The Voice this was not the first time he had suffered criminal activity at his lands, revealing thieves stole a solar panel from him last year.
Confirming they were investigating the matter, Tonota Station Commander, Oteng Ngada appealed to the public to come forward with any information that might lead to the perpetrators arrests.
Describing what his officers found when they attended the incident on Saturday evening, Ngada said, “Two of them [cows] were still at the scene not yet skinned. There were also two heads found – we assuming their carcasses were taken away in a vehicle as tire marks were visible at the scene.”
The Superintendent urged farmers to check-on and round-up their cattle every day, pointing out that stock theft is rife at this time of year.
“There is plenty of water everywhere and cattle roam around drinking at ponds and perpetrators capitalize on these gaps,” he warned.
