{"id":8807,"date":"2026-09-02T12:23:40","date_gmt":"2026-09-02T10:23:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/1nationmedia.com\/?p=8807"},"modified":"2026-09-03T00:05:59","modified_gmt":"2026-09-02T22:05:59","slug":"what-are-we-voting-for","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/1nationmedia.com\/index.php\/2026\/09\/02\/what-are-we-voting-for\/","title":{"rendered":"Commission revelations: When public office becomes a looting trough"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

As part of our series What are you voting for?<\/em>, Zingisa Mkhuma writes that South Africans heading to the polls in November can justifiably question not only who deserves their vote, but who can be entrusted with public authority, public wealth and the interests of the people.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

South Africa is bleeding \u2014 not metaphorically, but literally. Each bullet that silences a whistleblower, each body dumped in a dam and each oath of silence sworn in smoky backrooms is a reminder that corruption here is not a victimless crime. It kills.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Babita Deokaran knew this truth too well. The Chief Director of Financial Accounting at Gauteng\u2019s Department of Health flagged approximately R850 million in suspicious payments at Tembisa Hospital in Ekurhuleni. For her courage, she was gunned down outside her Johannesburg home in August 2021. Six men were subsequently convicted and sentenced for their roles in her murder, but those who ultimately ordered the assassination have yet to be brought to justice \u2014 a chilling reminder that justice in South Africa can stop at the foot soldiers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As if the killing of a woman in a hail of bullets was not horrific enough, four years later Ekurhuleni\u2019s audit head, Mpho Mafole, met a similar fate. On 30 June 2025, just days after submitting an audit that identified serious concerns around a R1.8-billion chemical toilet tender, he was killed only months into his job. Whether his murder was directly linked to his work remains a matter for investigation, but its timing sent a chilling message to those tasked with exposing municipal corruption.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then there was Emmanuel Mbense, murdered in his Brakpan home before his body was discarded in a dam near Nigel. Prosecutors allege his killing formed part of a macabre \u201cdeath pact\u201d sworn at Carnival City by rogue Ekurhuleni officials and their criminal allies \u2014 a pact in which silence was allegedly enforced by the threat of execution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Witness D at the Madlanga Commission, Marius \u201cVlam\u201d van der Merwe, dared to testify about corruption and misconduct within the Ekurhuleni Metropolitan Police Department (EMPD). Three weeks after giving evidence to the commission, on 5 December 2025, he was assassinated outside his home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These are not isolated tragedies. They form a disturbing pattern \u2014 a bloody ledger of corruption in Ekurhuleni, where those seeking to expose wrongdoing can find themselves in mortal danger while officials implicated in graft and misconduct remain protected until the machinery of justice eventually catches up with them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Suspended EMPD Deputy Chief Julius Mkhwanazi stands accused of serious misconduct, including allegations relating to unauthorised appointments and the activities of a rogue unit. Former City Manager Dr Imogen Mashazi has faced allegations that she obstructed efforts to act against him despite reports raising concerns about his conduct.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A political party laid criminal charges against Mashazi and businessman Ze Nxumalo after reports linked them to tender irregularities in Ekurhuleni. Those charges followed revelations of a multimillion-rand private jet trip to London undertaken by Mashazi in 2022, allegedly funded by companies linked to municipal business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Advocate Khemrja \u201cKemi\u201d Behari, once head of legal services, was dismissed and arrested amid allegations that she helped shield compromised officers. Linda Gxasheka, the municipality\u2019s former head of human resources, has faced allegations of fraud and corruption. City Manager Kagiso Michael Lerutla was implicated in an alleged scheme to pay an imposter to take the blame for his speeding violation. Businessman Vusimuzi \u201cCat\u201d Matlala has also been linked through testimony and investigations to the alleged misuse of municipal vehicles and blue-light escorts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These remain allegations that must ultimately be tested through the courts and other lawful processes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But what is happening in Ekurhuleni is not governance. It is gangsterism dressed in municipal suits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The killings of Deokaran, Mafole and Van der Merwe have exposed the rot surrounding institutions entrusted with safeguarding the public interest. They remind us that corruption is not merely about stolen billions or irregular tenders. It is about lives stolen, families shattered and public trust betrayed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

South Africans must ask: how many more whistleblowers must die before the state protects them? How many more families must bury loved ones before the political elite confronts the criminal networks embedded in public institutions?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The country is still grappling with revelations from the Madlanga Commission of Inquiry, announced by President Cyril Ramaphosa in July 2025 to investigate explosive allegations that organised crime and political interference had penetrated South Africa\u2019s criminal justice system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For nearly a year, witnesses have laid bare allegations surrounding the so-called \u201cBig Five\u201d \u2014 an alleged cartel encompassing tenderpreneurs, figures linked to the taxi industry, drug networks, senior police officers and politically connected individuals accused of manipulating South Africa\u2019s systems for profit and power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The allegations are chilling. Syndicates are accused not only of infiltrating government procurement but of using violence and intimidation to protect their interests. Whistleblowers such as Deokaran and politicians such as Sindiso Magaqa were assassinated after challenging powerful interests. Their deaths are stark reminders that the price of confronting corruption in South Africa can be fatal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What we are witnessing is not new. Since the 1990s, South Africa has faced the expansion of both domestic and transnational criminal networks involved in drug trafficking, vehicle smuggling, fraud and other forms of organised crime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As journalist Misha Glenny argued in McMafia<\/em>, South Africa\u2019s rapid political transition and the restructuring of apartheid-era security institutions created opportunities that international criminal syndicates were quick to exploit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But international organised crime could not have entrenched itself without local collaborators.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Foreign syndicates, domestic criminal networks, compromised officials, political actors and business interests have intersected over decades, allowing organised crime to penetrate legitimate economic structures and, in some instances, co-opt elements of law enforcement and government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The uncomfortable truth is that South Africa\u2019s corruption crisis cannot simply be blamed on outsiders or porous borders. Criminal networks flourish where public officials can be bought, political protection can be secured and institutions entrusted with enforcing the law are compromised from within.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

South Africa has tried to fight back. The Scorpions, launched in 1999, targeted organised crime and high-level corruption, investigating figures such as former police commissioner Jackie Selebi and then-deputy president Jacob Zuma.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the unit was disbanded following an ANC resolution at Polokwane in 2007. Critics viewed the decision as an attempt to shield politically powerful figures from prosecution. The Hawks, formed in 2009, replaced the unit, but questions have repeatedly been raised about whether it possesses sufficient institutional independence to confront corruption at the highest levels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Serious corruption and organised crime nevertheless continued to thrive, leaving ordinary citizens to bear the consequences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The sensational media briefing by KwaZulu-Natal provincial police commissioner Lt-Gen Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi on 6 July 2025 was a watershed moment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mkhwanazi publicly alleged the existence of a sophisticated criminal syndicate that had infiltrated law-enforcement and intelligence structures and accused powerful figures of interfering with police investigations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The implications were stark. If criminal networks could influence the very institutions tasked with investigating and prosecuting them, then the problem was no longer simply one of crime taking place outside the state. It was about criminal interests potentially operating from within and alongside the institutions of the state itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Madlanga Commission has illuminated the anatomy of capture, but illumination alone does not solve the problem. South Africa faces an existential question: can institutions hollowed out by cartels and corruption reclaim their integrity, or will syndicates continue to dictate the country\u2019s future?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What we know is that while the blood of our whistleblowers cries out for justice, their courage demands that we, as citizens, refuse to remain silent. Because silence about corruption \u2014 whether in Ekurhuleni, Johannesburg, Tshwane, Durban or Cape Town \u2014 is not merely complicity. It can have deadly consequences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With local government elections looming in November, political parties will once again ask South Africans to entrust them with municipal power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But elections alone cannot guarantee honest government. The ballot may determine who occupies public office; it cannot guarantee that those entrusted with authority will exercise it in the interests of the people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

South Africans can therefore justifiably ask: are they voting for public representatives who will safeguard public resources and serve their communities, or handing another blank cheque to those seeking access to the state coffers?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Zingisa Mkhuma is the editor of Ed News Africa<\/a> and the former editor of the Pretoria News and the Sunday Independent.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As part of our series What are you voting for?, Zingisa Mkhuma writes that South Africans heading to the polls in November can justifiably question not only who deserves their vote, but who can be entrusted with public authority, public wealth and the interests of the people. South Africa is bleeding \u2014 not metaphorically, but […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":8809,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[13,205],"tags":[519,341,280,405,455,340,282],"class_list":["post-8807","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-south-africa","category-trending","tag-1-nation-media","tag-corruption","tag-madlanga-commission","tag-one-nation-media","tag-onm","tag-police","tag-southafrica"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t