A view of Makhaleng River from Tsinyane Malealea © Billy Ntaote Billy Ntaote Residents of Tsinyane, which is a village tucked away on the outskirts of Malealea, Matelile, fear that if the Lesotho-Botswana Water Transfer Project begins it is going to mean they lose their ancestral homes as well as their livelihoods. While
Author: LESCIJ LESCIJ
SA company signs dubious deal over NMDS debt collections
The Ministry of Development Planning at Government Office Complex. Anti-corruption authorities are probing a deal between two companies which were battling for a lucrative government contract. Photo supplied. RELEBOHILE KHUTLANG A South African debt collecting company has struck a deal with a Lesotho competitor over a government tender to collect debt. The South
‘New energy’ rush is stripping DRC’s natural assets
Mining companies cashing in on global demand for cobalt are destroying protected nature reserves in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Jonas Kiriko visits reserves in the south of the country to investigate Border hotspot: Transport vehicles and small traders at the Kasumbalesa border post. An agent from the customs and excise department said
Widow’s home destroyed by roadworks in Polihali
Mamphasa Monethi As the M562 million construction of key roads linked to the Lesotho Water Highlands Project’s phase second phase powers ahead, a widow’s house near the construction works has been left damaged and possibly unsafe to live in. Contractors have taken some responsibility, done a quick patch of the house,
Local authorities feast on community compensation funds
Majara Molupe M2 million was paid to a community in compensation for land that was appropriated for a 70-megawatt solar power plant at Ha Ramarothole. But only a small fraction of that money was spent to improve community infrastructure, MNN can show that the vast bulk of the money was misappropriated
A watershed moment for citizens’ privacy and freedom
Liapeng Raliengoane Citizens, including journalists, are waiting for a landmark court ruling that will decide how much power the state has to seize information on citizens’ mobile phones without a court order, which will be delivered on November 17. The Constitutional Court has already ruled that the current law gives the state
The stigma of disability
Lesotho grapples with unlawful meddling in the reproductive rights of disabled girls and women The forced sterilisation of a deaf woman in Lesotho has flagged how families are secretly and illegally sterilising disabled daughters, giving them no say over their sexual and reproductive health rights. This is being done no matter
Woman loses house to fire as punishment for dating Polihali contractor
… Accuses Principal Chief of Recruiting Arsonists BILLY NTAOTE Tensions between local communities and contractors working on a new phase of the Lesotho Water Highlands Project (LHWP) have culminated in the Malingoaneng Principal Chief being charged with hiring men to torch his lover’s home. Principal Chief Qetho Sekonyela and his lover, Mamotonosi Sekonyela
Political appointments cripple Tšepong hospital
MATIISETSO MOSALA Senior politicians in Lesotho’s health ministry parachuted friends, family and party comrades into jobs at the flagship Queen ‘Mamohato Memorial Hospital (QMMH) in 2022, swelling the hospital’s wage bill. Many of the new appointees were not qualified. The first quarter of 2022 saw the highest staff intake in the hospital's
Royal Land Grabbing
The king has secretly been transferring state farms as well as others he holds in trust for his subjects, into his private company Nimrod Mabuza Nomsa Mngomezulu is from the impoverished, drought-prone Nkalashane area, under the Lomahasha chiefdom in the Lubombo region. She is currently Eswatini’s reigning woman farmer of the year, but
