RANGERS in Limpopo killed three escaped lions in the villages near the Kruger National Park in the Malamulele area.

However, three more lions were still roaming the bushes around the area and the hunt is still on for them.

Departmental spokesperson Joshua Kwapa said the lions had escaped at the weekend, threatening voter registration processes as villagers could not move from their villages to registration centres.

"We have dispatched a team of rangers to monitor and hunt the roaming lions," Kwapa said yesterday.

He said so far they suspected that the lions might have returned to the wild.

Kwapa said there were no reports from members of the communities about livestock killed by the lions.

They were suspected to have escaped from either the Kruger National Park or the bordering Makuya Game Reserve.

Rangers said the lions shot dead were found in villages and had to be killed to protect people and their livestock.

So far, hundreds of livestock have been lost to lions without compensation as there were no regulations that bound the lions' owners to compensate people for damages caused by the animals.