'Facebook rapist' Thabo Bester is seen on a television screen in the Western Cape High Court on 2 May 2012. Picture: Gallo Images / The Times / Shelley Christians
The person who blew the whistle on “Facebook rapist”, Thabo Bester has reportedly gone into hiding at an undisclosed location after receiving numerous threatening phone calls.
Last year, Nkosinathi Sekeleni exposed Bester’s relationship with celebrity doctor Nandipha Magudumana as the country learnt recently that the convicted rapist and murderer is still alive.
The Department of Correctional Services (DCS) confirmed on Saturday that Bester had indeed escaped from the Mangaung Correctional Centre in Bloemfontein, Free State.
The convict was believed to have died in a fire that broke out in his cell at the prison on 3 May 2022.
However, it has since emerged that the DNA of the body found in the cell did not match to Bester, who was convicted in 2012.
GroundUp, in recent weeks, has published several reports linking Bester to Magudumana after the couple was spotted at a Woolworths in Sandton City nearly two months after he escaped from prison.
The media coverage on Bester’s escape has since forced Sekeleni, who is Magudumana’s brother, to flee his home with his son and wife.
“We are practically homeless and I am in hiding… I fear for my life because of the articles that were written putting me at the centre for exposing my sister. I don’t know what dots to connect. I don’t know which high ranking officials are involved in this [case] and it can come back and bite me,” Sekeleni told City Press via telephone.
He pleaded for the authorities to provide his family with protection as the manhunt in search for Bester continues.
“I am pleading with the SA Police Service to please fix this thing and protect me, my wife and my son, who is only four years old. We are not safe.
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“I am always looking over my shoulder because I do not know what is happening. Somebody needs to tell me what is going on. Whether it’s the police or someone [who knows], they just need to explain if Bester died in that fire. I am very uncomfortable,” he said.
Sekeleni’s deleted Facebook post from more than a year ago has been making rounds on social media following the discovery that Bester could be living with his sister.
He confirmed to City Press that Magudumana reported him to the police after he made the post from his “hacked” Facebook account, but later dropped the defamation case.
“What happened now is that someone on Twitter brought back that status and aligned it with what is currently happening. I don’t know how she is doing now, I have not spoken to her in more than a week. I don’t know where she is,” Sekeleni said.
The Police and Prisons Civil Rights Union (Popcru) has blamed the Department of Correctional Service and G4S, the security company that runs the Mangaung Correctional Centre, for Bester’s escape.
“We are of the firm view that this escape, including multiple other misconducts and abuses reported over the years are mainly a consequence of the DCS having outsourced the functions of the state’s security to foreign-owned companies whose sole preoccupation is profit maximisation as opposed to the core mandate of rehabilitating inmates,” Popcru spokesperson Richard Mamabolo in a statement.
According to the union, a former employee at the prison has taken the management to the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA), while three other officials are currently under suspension.
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“Following this incident, there has since been an internal investigation which had been closed, wherein the security supervisor at the time was dismissed on charges of negligence as opposed to the causal factor behind the fire in the cell,” Mamabolo said.
“It is only now that the matter is reopened on the basis of media reports surrounding the whereabouts of Thabo Bester, which demonstrates that indeed the management of the centre tried to brush the matter under the carpet.”
This week, it was also revealed that Justice and Correctional Services Deputy Minister, Phathekile Holomisa, was informed, via email, by a prison warder that Bester had help when he allegedly escaped.
Meanwhile, Bester and Magudumana, along her two children, fled their rented R12m luxury home in Hyde Park, Johannesburg this week.
The couple appeared to use five houses over the past nine months, Sunday Times has reported.
The pair also spent money on two new Porsches and wore luxury clothes despite being in arrears on their rent, which totalled R175,000 per month for all the properties.
According to the publication, Magudumana discovered last month that Bester was renting a home from 4Tune Property Smiths estate agency in Morningside for a woman who was allegedly his mistress.
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