Nat Molomo
MASERU — Three brothers who are accused of assaulting their mother for allegedly having an affair with another man appeared in the Maseru Magistrate’s Court on Friday to answer charges of attempted murder.
They are also facing charges of arson and malicious damage to property.
‘Malinkeng Chaolane told the court that her three sons — Paramente, Nthura and Matsora — assaulted her with swords inside her house in Roma on the night of January 2 this year.
The mother, whose age was not revealed in court, alleged that her sons damaged her property and assaulted her before trying to set her house on fire.
The three sons pleaded not guilty to the charges.
Chaolane however told the magistrate, Motebele Mosisili, that she suspected her sons could have assaulted her because of a dispute over the family’s estate.
But the sons denied ever assaulting their mother saying there was no way they could have assaulted her because they loved her so much.
All they were against was their mother’s love affairs with other men, they told the court.
Chaolane said she was asleep in her room on January 2 when she heard the windows of her house being smashed.
“I got frightened and was surprised by what was happening.
“I woke up from my bed and stood at the corner near the door,” she told the court.
Chaolane submitted that she saw the accused enter her room through the window.
“They assaulted me with home-made swords and I bled from the head.
“I sustained injuries on the back and head. I blackened out,” she said.
She added that she was taken to Roma Hospital where she stayed for a week before being transferred to Queen Elizabeth II Hospital in Maseru.
She insisted that it was her sons who had assaulted her that night. She said she did not know why her sons had beaten her up.
“(But) I think it was because they wanted money,” she said.
Under cross-examination by defence lawyer, Advocate Khoete Metsing, Chaolane denied that she had ever allocated the accused plots in her family yard.
The mother also flatly denied being in love with a certain Ralijo.
But one of the sons, Paramente, insisted that when he got home that night it was Ralijo who emerged from their mother’s bedroom with the clear intention to fight him.
He said her mother intervened and stopped the fight.
The case was postponed to October 25-26.
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