Botswana authorities will this week hand over a hitman, Zimbabwean Dennis Moyo, to the South African authorities.
Moyo is accused of murdering a South African farmer.
He had been at large for a while and was arrested by the police in Gaborone during a police patrol.
Since his arrest in January this year, Moyo has been appearing before the Gabarone Village magistrate to formalize his extradition process and Botswana was then given the green light to hand him over to the South African authorities where he will stand trial for murder in the Limpopo province.
“This week Dennis Moyo will be handed over to the South African authorities after the court ruled that the suspect should be extradited to South Africa where he will stand trial for murder,” the case prosecutor, Priscilla Israel, of the Directorate of Public Prosecution (DPP), told The Telegraph.
She said Moyo is the first murder suspect so far to be extradited by Botswana to South Africa.
Meanwhile, there are about five murder suspects wanted in Botswana who are still hiding out in South Africa and they include two South Africans and three Batswana.
Jerry Phale, a Motswana murder suspect, is the only suspect who is still held in South African cells where he has been for over three years while the other four suspects are under surveillance.
The sixth suspect, Emmanuel Tsebe, died in South African cells late last year.
Information passed to The Telegraph suggests that Moyo, who was a farm worker, was allegedly hired by the deceased’s wife to kill his superior in 2003.
It is reported that after the incident, Moyo fled to his home country of Zimbabwe where he was later arrested by the Zimbabwean police.
The information revealed that during his arrest, both Zimbabwean and South African authorities did not follow the correct extradition procedures to extradite him to South Africa.
The South African court then ordered both governments to take Moyo back to Zimbabwe and follow the right channels of extradition.
Moyo allegedly escaped from Zimbabwean police custody and crossed illegally into Botswana where he hid for some time before being arrested in January.
