Botswana experienced a worrying increase in cases of rape and murder during the just-ended festive season, police said on Wednesday.
Police spokesperson Dipheko Motube said a total of 133 rape cases were recorded during the 2019/20 festive season compared to 110 the previous year.
In addition, there were 33 cases of men arrested on allegations of having sexual intercourse with under-age girls, up from 16 such incidents during the previous year.
Motube said attributed the increase to the increase of age of consent from 16 to 18 years.
This comes on the backdrop of reports in November 2019 that incidents of rape have nearly doubled in 2018 in Botswana.
The police revealed at the time that there were 1,600 reported cases of rape in the first three quarters of 2019 – almost double compared to that period for each of the previous two years.
Meanwhile, Motube confirmed that three siblings have appeared in court for the alleged murder of a Zimbabwean national while another suspect, Mothusi Rapoo was arraigned before the courts for the alleged murder of a two-year-old toddler following a misunderstanding with its mother.
On a similar matter, Motube said two men, Aobakwe Baleseng and Mogorosi Korae also appeared in court for killing a 27-year-old woman.
Motube further stated that a mob in Gaborone had fatally assaulted a 23-year-old man during the festive season for allegedly breaking into a motor vehicle.
He described the latest crime statistics as worrying given the fact that Botswana’s population was less than two million.
KO/jn/APA