A presenter on Lesotho’s Harvest FM, Reverend Adam Lekhoaba, has won a
court challenge to his deportation in the Lesotho High Court, writes
Mzimkhulu Sithetho.
The high court set aside his deportation and ordered the state to pay costs.
Lekhoaba is now able to return to his wife and son from whom he had been separated since March 2007, when he was deported.
The move came just after the February 2007 snap election when it was discovered that he possessed a South African Identity document and a passport.
The court ruled in his favour after a court-appointed referee testified that he was born in Thaba-Tseka, a remote district in Lesotho, and that his parents are Basotho citizens who fled the country in the 1970’s for political reasons.
The court found that Lekhoaba had acquired South Africa ID at 17 years when he was still a minor and that he attained that country’s passport at 27 years.
It found that his particulars on the passport had been obtained from the ID and that he could not be held liable for possession of the SA ID.
While forced to live across the border in SA, Lekhoaba disclosed that Prime Minister Pakalitha Mosisili also possessed South African ID.
After his court victory, he convened a press conference in which he told Basotho he was ready to take on the government of Lesotho for its problems. He is now returning to his morning phone-in programme, Rise and Shine as anchor presenter.
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