The country’s criminal justice is in a dire state which threatens not only the safety of its citizens but also the very foundations of state legitimacy.
As reported by this publication’s sister paper, the Lesotho Times, this past week, only 27 percent of the nearly 6000 criminal cases recorded between July 2024 and June 2025 have made it to court. The bulk remainder police dockets, including shocking numbers of sexual assaults, robberies, stock thefts, and murders, lie unresolved, gathering dust.
This is not just about crime statistics; it is an indictment of a system crumbling under the weight of chronic underfunding.
At the core is a gross mismatch between the enormity of crime in Lesotho and the meagre resources allocated to fight it.
The Lesotho Mounted Police Service (LMPS), particularly its Criminal Investigation Division (CID), is being asked to perform miracles with almost nothing. Investigating serious crimes requires trained personnel, forensic capabilities, secure transportation, and, crucially, money.
Yet our police are expected to: gather DNA evidence without a lab; provide witness protection without a program; and maintain public trust while watching dangerous criminals walk free for lack of evidence.
Deputy Commissioner of Police Paseka Mokete was brutally honest when he said investigations are a complex process which need funding.
Indeed, no matter how capable or well-trained a police force may be, without the tools to act, its efforts will always fall short.
No wonder even the most egregious crimes are going unpunished, and the public is losing faith.
And herein lies the greater danger.
When the criminal justice system becomes paralysed, when reports to police seldom lead to arrests or convictions, when citizens are too afraid to testify because there is no protection for them, the result is a fertile breeding ground for lawlessness.
Impunity becomes the norm while criminals become emboldened, and communities lose hope. In this void, mob justice, vigilantism, and deepening social instability fester.
It is a tragic irony that in a country where the threat of crime is so pervasive, investment in crime-fighting tools remains very low. Forensic samples must be sent to South Africa, which often results in years-long delays, while key witnesses flee the country and cannot be brought back for trial.
Without proper witness protection or even basic incentives such as security guarantees, cooperation from the public remains elusive, further weakening the already thin cases investigators attempt to build.
All the while, the courts remain burdened with delays of their own, undermining whatever limited progress police could have made.
The case of former army commander Tlali Kamoli is a grim reminder of this, with charges dating back over a decade still unresolved. Such sluggishness in the judiciary only deepens the erosion of public confidence and reinforces the perception that justice in Lesotho is only for a select few.
It would be wrong to lay all the blame at the feet of the LMPS or the judiciary because the rot is systemic, and its cure must be political. The government must confront the hard truth: justice cannot be delivered on goodwill alone. It requires strategic investment.
That means budgeting for the building of forensic labs in-country and creating a proper witness protection framework. It means resourcing investigators with vehicles, protective gear, and analytical tools, and it also means ensuring that those trained to fight crime are skilled enough to do so.
Moreover, there must be a broader conversation about the kind of policing Lesotho needs in the 21st century.
DCP Mokete rightly notes that modern crime, such as cybercrime and financial fraud, demans a different skills set of analysts, digital forensic experts, and psychological profilers.
Building such capacity is an urgent necessity.
But no amount of investment or training will suffice unless the culture of public disengagement is reversed and for that to happen, the public must see results. They must see arrests that lead to convictions, and they must feel that their cooperation matters and that means rebuilding trust from the ground up. It means transparency, accountability, and a clear message that justice is possible in Lesotho.
We must resist the temptation to normalise this crisis. We must refuse to accept a country where almost three-quarters of reported crimes go unprosecuted. We must reject a justice system that fails to protect its most vulnerable, that lets rapists, murderers, and thieves roam free simply because the state is not investing enough resources to pursue them.
This is not just a policing issue but is a national emergency. If the government does not respond with urgency and ambition, we risk descending into a lawless society where violence dictates daily life and justice becomes a distant memory. The time for excuses has long passed. What Lesotho needs now is action because anything less means authorities are complicit in a system that fails its people.