Five arrested after South African cattle farmer shot, stabbed and mutilated in farm robbery

South African police have arrested five people in connection with a brutal attack on a cattle farmer who was shot, stabbed and mutilated during a house robbery, in a case that has caused widespread outrage in a country accustomed to high levels of violence. Donovan Marx, 50, was ambushed as he returned home to his farm near Ventersdorp, a small town in North West province, last Wednesday. Police said a group of masked men armed with guns first approached a worker who was mowing the lawn, demanded to know where Marx was, and tied the worker's hands and feet with cable ties. When Marx arrived, two of the suspects allegedly approached him and shot him in the upper body, according to a police statement. They then dragged him inside the house, tied his hands and feet and stabbed him. Police said his ears were cut off during the ordeal. The suspects ransacked the house, took three firearms from a safe and escaped in Marx's van. The attack ended when the farm worker managed to free himself and call for assistance. Marx was rushed to hospital, where he remains, and may need prosthetic ears after surgeons were unable to save his own, local news site IOL reported. All five alleged attackers, aged between 26 and 56, were arrested over the weekend. They are due to appear in local courts on Tuesday facing charges of house robbery, attempted murder and illegal possession of firearms and ammunition. Marx's wife and family welcomed the swift arrests and said the legal process must now take its course. Agriculture Minister Willie Aucamp condemned the attack, saying there was no place in the country for such senseless and barbaric acts. Ian Cameron, chair of parliament's police committee, praised the police for the rapid arrests and called for a strong, properly investigated case to follow. The case has drawn international attention because of a broader dispute over farm violence. Some right-wing groups have used attacks on white farmers, who are often from the Afrikaner community, to claim there is a genocide against white people in South Africa. That claim has been widely discredited and has been dismissed by every political party in the country, including those representing Afrikaners, although US President Donald Trump has repeated it and offered white Afrikaners asylum in the United States. South Africa's latest crime statistics, covering the period between April and June 2026, do not specify how many attacks took place on farms and recorded only one robbery in a rural area. Police data show that most victims of crime in South Africa, including on farms, are black.