Axed SA embassy official ‘scapegoated’ to protect Mapisa-Nqakula and sister

An embassy official who helped Defence Minister Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula smuggle a young woman out of the Democratic Republic of Congo three year ago in her state jet appears to have taken the fall for the scandal in order to protect the minister and her sister.

The Sunday Times reported at the weekend that Abdoulkarim Ciza was abandoned in jail and later fired from his job after he was instructed by the minister’s sister, Nosithembele Mapisa (the former SA deputy ambassador to Burundi at the time), to help Michelle Wege, a Burundian national, leave the country because she was a family friend and had been allegedly abused by her father.

Ciza claims that the minister’s sister told him that the instructions came from Mapisa-Nqakula to help the 20-year-old get into South Africa on a fraudulent document.

However, Wege’s father, Burundian businessman Laurent Wege, denied the abuse claims in May last year when the story first broke, telling the paper his daughter had told him she was engaged to the minister’s son, Chumani, who died in 2015 in a stabbing incident.

Wege was also reported to be living at the minister’s home in Bruma, Johannesburg, at the time.

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When the operation to fetch Wege on January 28, 2014, went wrong, Ciza and Wege were arrested in the DRC after officials in the country become suspicious. Wege was whisked away to South Africa in Mapisa-Nqakula’s jet, while Ciza was left in jail and later fired for his role in the operation.

Government sources told the Sunday Times that, apparently, a political compromise had been reached behind the scenes to make Ciza the scapegoat and fire him to protect the Mapisa sisters despite the incident being well-documented by several high-ranking officials.

“Nosithembele was suspended for 17 months for her role in the matter and subsequently reinstated without going through any disciplinary hearing,” one source was quoted as saying.

He was charged with “damaging the name of the Republic of South Africa by being instrumental in the smuggling out [of] a Burundi national by the name of Michelle Wege to the DRC, using fraudulent documents at the Kinshasa airport, heading for South Africa under the false name of Amina Yambayamba”.

Ciza, after working for the SA embassy for more than a decade, was released from the DRC jail after paying a fine to prison officials. Upon his return to work, SA’s ambassador to Burundi, Oupa Monareng, initiated disciplinary action against him and later dismissed in August 2015.

Nosithembele was suspended in April 2014 and reinstated in August 2015. Her term in Burundi ended in December, and she is now a director for Gulf states in the Middle East and Asia branch, according to the paper.

Ciza claims that he wrote to Labour Minister Mildred Oliphant and International Relations Minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabane last month, asking the ministries to investigate his “unfair dismissal”. The labour department said it was not aware of his letter, while Clayson Monyela, international relations spokesperson, said he could not comment on the matter, as it was an internal issue.

Mapisa-Nqakula has refused to answer questions from the paper, saying, through her spokesperson, that she did not want to have anything to do with the Sunday Times.

President Jacob Zuma’s office reportedly said last week that he was still “engaging” the minister about the incident.

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