Vhembe region on its way to becoming Limpopo’s political killing field

The Vhembe region is slowly becoming the Limpopo political killing field, following a number of political murders in recent months, with the latest being mayor Moses Maluleke of Collins Chabane local municipality in Limpopo.

Maluleke, 56, affectionately known as Bra Big Moss, and ANC Vhembe deputy regional secretary, was gunned down outside his home in Saselman, near Malamulele, on Thursday night.

His son was wounded.

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Vhembe is the the second biggest ANC region in Limpopo in terms of membership after Norman Mashanane in the Mopani district.

From 2019 to date, the region has seen three political heavyweights killed. It begun with the assassination of two SA Municipal Workers Union (Samwu) members in the Vhembe district municipality.

Timson Musetsho and Ronald Mani were gunned down in 2019.

They were allegedly killed for speaking out against the contentious decision by the Vhembe district municipality to invest more than R300 million in the controversial VBS Mutual Bank.

Thabo Sibanze, Percy, Ndivhuwo and Simon Radzuma were later arrested for the killings.

Sibanze faces two counts of murder and possession of an unlicensed firearm and ammunition while the Radzuma brothers faced six counts of murder and 10 of possession of unlicensed firearms and ammunition.

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Collins Chabane is one of 15 municipalities, including North West, Gauteng and Limpopo, which illegally invested more than R1. 5 billion into the collapsed VBS Mutual Bank.

The municipality invested R120 million with the bank and erstwhile municipal manager Charlotte Ngobeni and chief finance officer Eddie Makamu were later arrested by the Hawks for illegally investing the money with the bank.

Maluleke’s murder is the sixth in the province in two years after two Mogalakwena municipality councillors were also gunned down.

The two councillors, Valtyne Kekana, 54, and Ralph Kanyane, 32, were vocal about the mass looting of municipal funds through tender corruption involving more than R15 million.

Another casuality of political killings in Limpopo was Thabang Maupa, a 54-year-old ANC ward 5 councillor in the Fetakgomo-Tubatse local municipality.

He was gunned down after closing his restaurant along the R37 road between Burgersfort and Chuenespoort in 2019.

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