Duo pay heavy price for pangolin
“We found a pangolin in the bush and we loved it. We decided to keep it to attract tourists and make money,” 43-year-old Kelvin Maposa sheepishly told court after being busted with the protected animal in Ghetto recently.
The money-making scheme backfired disastrously for the Zimbabwean and his fellow countrymen, Matitshidza Sibanda, 33, who will spend the next four years of their lives behind bars.
Acting on a tip-off, the police raided the duo at their accommodation in Francistown’s Colored location on 22 July, catching the two men red-handed with the pangolin. It is thought they had only been in the country for three days before falling foul of the law.
Although they admitted having the scaly mammal in their possession, both men insisted they were unaware it was illegal to do so.
“We like rearing animals, so after seeing it we thought by rearing it will be more like creating employment for ourselves as people will be coming to see it and pay us. We left Zimbabwe to escape poverty and thought this animal had been sent to us by God. We didn’t know it was against the law,” explained an anxious Sibanda, breathing nervously as he waited to hear if his reasoning would get him off the hook.
It did not.
Instead, Principal Magistrate Tshepo Magetse, sentenced the border jumpers to four years in the slammer for capturing a protected animal, as well as another year for being in Botswana illegally.
Fortunately for the duo, who left court on the verge of tears, the sentences will run concurrently. Unfortunately, however, it means they will remain incarcerated until 2027 – a heavy price to pay for an attempt at a quick buck.
