Batswana have reportedly become the latest target by South African armed criminals, it has emerged.
This follows two separate incidents in which Botswana citizens were robbed by armed criminals at various places where they had lodged.
According to a press release issued by the South African Police Service, the Tzaneen Cluster Task Team has launched a massive manhunt for a group of unknown armed suspects involved in two separate business robberies which occurred in the Bolobedu and Mokwakwaila Policing areas outside Tzaneen. The robberies were committed in the early hours of Monday this week.
According to the release, it is alleged that a group of about five armed suspects wearing balaclavas arrived at the local Motel at Ga-Maphalle village in the Bolobedu Policing area at around 01:20.
They then accosted a security guard on duty, pointed him with firearms, assaulted him and tied him to a tree and robbed him of cash and cell phones. They proceeded to the rooms where clients were sleeping and robbed them of an undisclosed amount of money and two cell phones before they fled the scene.
Meanwhile in the Mokwakwaila Policing area, the release further states that the local lodge at Block 17 village was also robbed in the early hours on Monday at about 02:45.
It is alleged that a group of about four armed suspects pointed the security guard with firearms before storming into the rooms where clients were sleeping and robbed them of an undisclosed amount of money and cell phones.
They subsequently drove away with a victim’s Dyna truck with registration numbers B923AEN loaded with bags of mopani worms and disappeared.
The release states that the “victims in both incidents are Botswana citizens”. Cases of business robberies were opened for further police investigations.
