Another South African farmer has been reported killed after three gunmen attacked his homestead — part of a sustained campaign of violence across the country.
The alleged attack took place in Potchefstroom in the North West province, according to Times Live. The elderly victim was pronounced dead at the scene by paramedics from the private ambulance company ER24.
OFM, a radio station based in Central South Africa, put the farmer’s age at 69, and quoted police spokeswoman Pelonomi Makau as saying the killers were driven off by his son following a high-stakes altercation:
“They saw three suspects hiding at a fence who shot at the farm owner,” she said. “He died at the scene and the son managed to fight back the suspects. He managed to confiscate a firearm, knife and cell phone from the suspects. They then fled the scene.”
The killing is just the latest in a series of murders which the government has been accused of encouraging, and which have made farming in South Africa the most deadly occupation in the world.
South African farm killings — where victims are typically members of the country’s white, Afrikaans-speaking minority — are often extremely brutal in nature, involving prolonged periods of torture.
While they are little-reported even within South Africa itself — the government directed police to stop releasing information about victims’ ethnicity in 2007 — one recent murder which made headlines was that of 64-year-old former…