While respecting the family, the public still demands clarity on Mthethwa’s alleged role in criminal and corrupt networks.
When the news broke that South Africa’s ambassador to France, Nathi Mthethwa, died last week, the question uppermost in many people’s minds was: was it because his name was mentioned at the Madlanga Commission of Inquiry?
Although the circumstances around his death are yet to be clarified, early indications are that Mthethwa, the former minister of police from 2008 to 2014, took his own life by jumping to his death from the 22nd floor of a hotel in Paris.
Although he gained notoriety as the minister of sport, arts and culture who wanted to build a R22 million monument of the national flag, it was as minister of police that he was mentioned at the Madlanga commission.
The timing of his death means there are questions to which the commission and the country will never get answers to.
Although respect needs to be given to his grieving family and friends, the greatest commitment must be to uncovering the truth behind the allegations that General Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi made that the former minister of police contributed to the political influence that allowed alleged criminals to evade law enforcement, while unlawfully extracting state funds for their own selfish benefit.
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Not many South Africans will remember Shonisani Lethole, who died at the height of the Covid pandemic in June 2020, and that health ombud prof Malegapuru Makgoba found that at the time of his death he had gone for over 100 hours without being fed.
How is the death of South Africa’s ambassador to France related to possibly the worst betrayal of the public’s trust in the death of Lethole?
Mthethwa, in his capacity as a senior ANC leader, as well as former minister of police, was part of a leadership that allowed tenderpreneurs to steal the funds meant to provide food for Lethole.
This week, Crime Intelligence boss General Dumisani Khumalo implicated North West businessman Brown Mogotsi in being the link between alleged criminals and the minister of police.
While it is not clear what official role Mogotsi played in the police department, the WhatsApp messages that Khumalo revealed at the commission make it clear he had access to senior ANC leadership – including minister Senzo Mchunu – while at the same time he was in communication with people like Vusimuzi “Cat” Matlala, who is alleged to be part of the syndicate that extracted over R2.3 billion from Tembisa Hospital.
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In what can only be a Freudian slip this weekend, ANC secretary-general Fikile Mbalula divulged that Mogotsi sent him a message “which I will not even bother to respond to”.
Mbalula might think that his public dismissal of Mogotsi is enough to create distance between them, but he just confirmed that the man at the centre of what is surely an unholy alliance between criminals and senior ANC/government leadership also has access to him, the most senior leader of the ANC after President Cyril Ramaphosa.
Granted, Mthethwa was police minister 10 years ago, but it has become clear that the atmosphere allowed “businessmen” access to loot funds meant for the likes of Lethole at Tembisa Hospital.
Mkhwanazi is on record stating he experienced the “worst political interference under police minister Nathi Mthethwa”.
The gall to issue instructions to an acting national police commissioner on how to do his job was a part of a sliding scale that led to the atmosphere that the likes of Mogotsi now exploit to manipulate senior government leaders.
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