MISTAKEN FOR A POACHER

TSHANENI - Rangers protecting game for Inyoni Yami Swaziland Irrigation Scheme (IYSIS) in Tshaneni allegedly fired four shots, wounding an on-duty sugar cane guard, on suspicion that he was a poacher.

Mandlenkosi Mahlalela (37) was standing guard outside the sugar cane fields owned by the Royal Swaziland Sugar Corporation (RSSC) in Mhlume when two rangers approached him. He is an employee of RSSC.

IYSIS keeps its game on Farm H13 in Tshaneni, east of the country. The farm stretches to Mhlume where Mahlalela was shot.
In an interview, the wounded sugar cane guard said a doctor told him that one of his bones was crushed.
He said the rangers claimed they mistook him for a fleeing suspected poacher they were pursuing.

He said he was in doubt that the rangers spotted someone poaching because the only man he apparently (Mahlalela) saw was a man carrying a net for fishing. He said this man was fishing from a dam located adjacent to the IYSIS farm and sugar cane fields belonging to RSSC.
“I think that is the man they saw but he was carrying fish, not game,” he said. Mahlalela, currently admitted at the Mbabane Clinic, said two gunshots hit him on the heel. The other two were fired in the air.

He has been in hospital since December 7, this year.  He said the gunshots had virtually rendered him disabled.
He is traumatised by the fact that a doctor hinted on a prospect of amputating his left leg which was hit by two bullets.
“I see a hole in my heel and this affects me. I have been sternly warned against talking to you but I am in anguish here,” Mahlalela said. 

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