Some of the members of the Lesotho Defence Force (LDF) who are currently detained at the Lesotho Correctional Services (LCS) custody where they await trial for multiple crimes are complaining about the institution’s conditions which they say are not fit for human habitation.

The soldiers, Lance Corporal Leutsoa Motsieloa and Corporal Ts’itso Ramoholi who have filed a case at the High Court asking among others, to be released on bail, say they ask to be released on bail because the life in the LCS custody is unbearable and not suitable for their health.

The duo has been in custody since 2017 and is charged with the murders of Lesotho Mounted Police Service (LMPS)’s Sub-Inspector Mokheseng Ramahloko and former army Commander Lieutenant General Maaparankoe Mahao respectively.

According to their founding affidavit that is before court, the duo say the holding cells at Maseru Central Correctional Institution are overcrowded, unhygienic and filthy. The toilets do not have running water and they have to collect water before they are locked up at 3pm and the collected water does not sustain occupants of a single cell until the following morning.

They also explain that each cell is flooded with 20 plus inmates and during night when nature calls they help themselves in the presence of others; they sleep with urine and excrement since the toilets have no running water. Further they keep their food parcel under the same conditions.