RUNDU - Officials from the ministry of environment were on Wednesday dispatched to some communal farms in the Samagayigayi area of the Shambyu traditional jurisdiction in Kavango East to investigate reports that there are lions feeding on their livestock.

Lion tracks were reported to be all over, while over 30 goats and a donkey were reportedly attacked by the wild cats.

“We have sent out our rangers to visit the area and to assist the farmers to contain the situation there. But we haven’t yet received feedback from them as I am currently out of office with other official duties in the Mukwe constituency,’’ said the environment ministry’s deputy director for the north-east regions, Apollinaris Kanyinga.

He added that since most farmers don’t stay or visit their farms regularly, farmworkers find it difficult to mitigate the issue in order to protect the livestock. 

“Everything is left to the workers,’’ he said.

Kanyinga told New Era that his office has also communicated to the minister to declare them as problem lions. 

“We heard that these lions have even caught livestock from a kraal, which is not common. In order to contain the situation and if we locate these lions, we are planning to bring in professional hunters to take them down,’’ he stated.

Samagayigayi 

According to some farmers who spoke to this reporter last month, lions killed a donkey at one farm before proceeding to kill a horse at another.

“They came to threaten cattle at my kraal,” said one farmer on a farmers’ platform, but opted to remain anonymous. 

“It could be the same squad because we only tracked them as passing through Samagayigayi farms. Now, they are on surrounding farms. Every night, they are killing livestock and moving in the direction of the border with the Tsumkwe constituency,’’ he added.

The lions are dangerous, and farmers have requested environment officials to put them down.