Mob-style hits could get worse, as criminals start to feel the heat

The recent spate of targeted assassinations seen across the country have rattled security experts, prompting warnings that more people, including witnesses, prosecutors, and even magistrates, could be taken out as the Hawks begin to swoop on those fingered in criminal activities.

With the country’s law enforcement agencies and the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) severely compromised and hollowed out in the past decade, former police officers said lawlessness took root and the elimination of rivals escalated.

According to forensic investigations and risk consultancy firm D & K Management Consultants, gangland-style hits are expected to escalate as these institutions begin to regain integrity and turn up the heat on criminals, including corrupt officials and organised crime bosses.

They believe it is now that the country’s entrenched culture of elimination of rivals to resolve disputes, be it political, business or gang related, as well as silencing of witnesses to escape justice is expected to reach crisis alarming levels.

Chad Thomas, independent organised crime investigator at IRS Forensic Investigations, said if not quelled, SA may suffer the same fate as the city of Medellín in Columbia, where law enforcement officials, prosecutors, and judges were assassinated in the mid to late 1980’s and early 1990’s.

There was a heavy police presence as the suspect Zane Killian appeared at Bishop Lavis Magistrate’s Court for Charl Kinnear murder case on October 09, 2020 in Cape Town, South Africa. It is reported that Lieutenant-Colonel Charl Kinnear was shot dead outside his home in September. (Photo by Gallo Images/Brenton Geach)

He said assassinations in SA had become a regular occurrence, and are becoming an easy way to settle disputes, retain or gain turf, silence witnesses, or to prevent an investigation from proceeding.

“If this is allowed to happen, then South Africa will descend fast into a failed state scenario… Assassinations amongst rival gangs is commonplace, but not so much the assassination of lawyers and law enforcement officers, and herein lies the concern. If high profile police officers can be taken out in broad daylight, what prevents assassinations of prosecutors and judges? We have already seen lawyers assassinated in Cape Town, so what prevents this practice of assassination from escalating?” he asked.

Thomas said assassinations were not limited to the underworld, with significant numbers of political assassinations in KwaZulu-Natal and, to a lesser degree in other provinces such as Mpumalanga happening fairly regularly, while the taxi industry also sees regular killings over turf.

Close-protection and risk expert, Kyle Condon, said Columbia type hits were playing out already in SA and that these contracts are issued by criminal syndicates, political and business rivals, or for the silencing of potential witnesses.

“We will see a spike in assassinations as the Hawks are taking action, doing something tangible (against criminals), including senior people in government… Without effective policing, it will peak to the point of hired hitmen taking out prosecutors and judges,” he said.

Condon said a good example of the silencing of witnesses was the assassination of the 52-year-old Stanley Khanyile, Sedibeng municipal manager, who was gunned down while sitting in his car in the parking lot of the Meyersdal Mall in Alberton in the East of Johannesburg last Saturday afternoon.

Khanyile was facing a raft of charges, including fraud, nepotism, and flouting of supply chain management processes, and a report into his conduct was due just days after his murder.

Assassinations nothing new in SA

Condon, founder and managing director at D & K Management Consultants, said there was no short supply of hitmen, and one could be found at a taxi rank for as little as R5000.

Former policeman Dawie Naude said assassinations have always been part of SA, and that they had been sanctioned and mastered by the then apartheid government, for use against its political and ideological rivals.

He said post-1994 the hits were no longer state-sanctioned but never stopped, and simply became the domain of criminal syndicates in turf wars, silencing of witnesses or investigators, as well as elimination of party political rivals for access to tenders, power and positions.

Naude, now a specialist private investigator at Sleuth Investigative Services, a Johannesburg-based detective agency, said targeted hits were escalating at an alarming level and that this was a huge cause for concern.

“I have constantly have to look over my shoulder because I am a target of various hits, due to some of the assassinations that I am investigating… People behind these hits have money and are ruthless. Hitmen are all over, with so many young boys who would do anything for R5000. We are headed in a horrifying direction,” Naude said.

Some notable hits:

• January 2009: Mbombela municipality, Jimmy Mohlala, is gunned down on the driveway of his home at KaNyamazane outside Mbombela, three days before he was to submit evidence surrounding the building of the R1.2bn 2010 World Cup Mbombela Stadium.

• May 2010: Teazers strip club kingpin Lolly Jackson is gunned down at a rented house in Edleen, east of Johannesburg.

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A month before he was hit, Jackson had reportedly claimed that his rival, Greek businessman Michael Kalymnios, had offered R100 000 for his death.

• October 2015: North West billionaire Wandile Bozwana is killed at a red traffic light at the Garsfontein offramp after several shots were fired at him and a business partner. A feared Mamelodi taxi boss, Vusi “Khekhe” Mathibela, one of the accused in the murder, is alleged to have paid for the hit.

Months before he was killed, Bozwana had reportedly stopped the former North West government from distributing tenders worth R470 million.

• June 2017: Free State businessman Ignatius Mpambani is shot dead in his R3-million Bentley in Sandton‚ Johannesburg.

Entrepreneur Ignatius Mpambani was gunned down in broad daylight by four suspects on Bowling Avenue in Kramerville, Sandton on 20 June 2017.

He was linked to the dodgy R255m Free State human settlement department’s asbestos deal which is currently making headlines again in testimony at the Commission of Inquiry into State Capture, and due to the arrest of several high-ranking politicians and business people linked to the tender.

• September 2017: Sindiso Magaqa, ANC PR councillor at uMzimkhulu Local Municipality, succumbed to multiple gunshot wounds in hospital. He and others were ambushed and shot with AK47s in July 2017. Magaqa had just uncovered tender corruption related to the construction of a memorial hall at uMzimkhulu.

• December 2017: Cullinan magistrate Victor Mabunda, is fatally shot four times in the driveway of his home in Bronkhorstpruit.

In November last year the court found that former warders Thomo Ngoato, Paulos Fourie and the erstwhile inmate, Thato Maringa, had killed Mabunda in a plot to get rid of him. He was residing over a case of smuggling drugs into the Cullinan Correctional Centre.

Mabunda had allegedly refused to take a bribe to scupper the case.

• October 2018: Cape Town lawyer Pete Mihalik is gunned down outside his son’s upmarket school in Green Point.

t is believed the hit was ordered by in the Cape Town’s senior underworld figures.

July 2019: Soccer star and commentator Mark Batchelor was gunned down in his car outside his home in Olivedale, Johannesburg.

At the time, police were said to be investigating his alleged ties to a massive stash of cocaine that had been seized in a tractor imported from South Africa. He also allegedly had ties to Serbian mobsters operating in South Africa.

• December 2019: Cape Town lawyer, Vernon Jantjies, shot dead outside a shop at a filling station in Mitchells Plain. Jantjies was known for defending several clients with links to alleged organised crime.

• September 2020: Anti-Gang Unit section head, Charl Kinnear, is gunned down in the driveway of his Bishop Lavis home.

The detective was investigating a nationwide gun licensing racket involving SAPS officials, gang leaders and members, and was reportedly closing in on the “Gauteng mafia” and its illicit gold and diamond dealings.

• October 2020: Sedibeng District Municipality’s manager, Stanley Khanyile, is shot dead while sitting in his Mercedes-Benz at the parking lot of Meyersdal Mall in Alberton in the East of Johannesburg.

He was allegedly killed days before advocate William Mokhari was to hand in his report on charges of misconduct against Khanyile. He faced a string of allegations, including illegally appointing a legal firm without authorisation, purchasing a R5 million house by forging his wife’s signature and employment of a director in his office despite having previous record of dismissal for fraud and corruption in the Eastern Cape.

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