Former Lesotho  deputy prime minister Mothetjoa Metsing last week fled to South Africa, claiming his life was at risk.

 Metsing, who lost his position after a snap poll in June, saw a new coalition government come into power, “I received some threats that there is a plot to have me killed; the plot was going to be executed in either me getting arrested and dying in police custody or by assassination.”

Metsing’s deputy in the Lesotho Congress for Democracy (LCD) party, Tseliso Mokhosi – who had been defence minister in the previous administration – was charged with the murder of a police officer last year.

 Metsing claims that since new (and former) Prime Minister Tom Thabane’s inauguration, Lesotho has become “a police state”. It’s worth noting that Metsing and Thabane have history. In 2014, the LCD defected from their two-year-old coalition with Thabane’s All Basotho Convention (ABC) party, accusing the then (and now) prime minister of failing to consult his partners and kicking off a turbulent year that included a nine-month suspension of parliament, a quasi-coup attempt and an early election that ousted Thabane.