Despite working with police on the investigation into his sister and her partner in crime , Nkosinathi Sekeleni is determined to stand behind her in her upcoming trial.
Sekeleni's sister Nandipha Magudumana is being charged for aiding and abetting rapist and murderer Thabo Bester in his escape last May from Mangaung maximum security prison.
“When you see your sister on the news like that, you feel for her. That’s my sister. There are feelings from me [about what she allegedly did], but that is my sister.”
Sekeleni told the Sunday Times he has spoken to the police regarding Bester’s audacious escape after he allegedly faked his death by setting alight his prison cell in Mangaung Correctional Centre in May 2022.
He claimed he alerted the police to the suspected escape in an e-mail that month but nobody responded. However, he is now working with the police whom he said are also investigating whey the e-mail was ignored. He declined to share a copy of the e-mail.
“I spoke to a warrant officer [who was] following up [on] the e-mail that I wrote to the SAPS in May 2022 and they were following up on why nobody ever responded to the e-mail. So it was internal stuff that they were investigating,” said Sekeleni.
“I am also expecting to write a statement to another police officer, but I am awaiting further correspondence from him to understand what he wants.”
Magudumana along with her father, Cornelius Sekeleni, and G4S guards, Senohe Matsoara and Motanyane Masukela, and Teboho Lipholo are due to appear in the Bloemfontein Magistrate's Court on May 3 for helping Bester tp escape last May from the prison.
Lipholo worked at Integritron, which maintained the prison’s CCTV cameras, until he was fired over his alleged role in the escape. The five face charges of defeating the ends of justice with Magudumana and Matsoara also accused of murder and interfering with a body.
The murder and interfering with a body charges relate to Magudumana claiming the bodies of three unknown people, one of which she allegedly had Matsoara smuggle into Bester’s prison cell and set alight as part of his elaborate fake suicide escape plan.
Cornelius Sekeleni was granted R10,000 bail this week.
The five are due back in court on May 3 and 4, while Bester is scheduled to appear in court on May 16.
Bester and Magudumana were arrested in Tanzania earlier this month three weeks after they fled from their Hyde Park mansion in March when photographs of the couple shopping in Woolworths in Johannesburg surfaced.
Sekeleni told the Sunday Times this week that Bester ruled Magudumana with an iron fist, losing his temper and frequently flying into fits of rage when she disobeyed him.
An audio clip recently emerged on social media in which a man, who Sekeleni insists is Bester, can be heard berating a woman, who he says is his sister.
In the recording the man screams at the woman for blocking his cellphone number and warns that he is travelling to Johannesburg that night.
“You are doing your own things. I told you, you don’t do things in this house. Do you understand that?
“The fact that you were upset and blocked my number that’s the last time in your life. If you ever block my number you will find you and your clothes on the f…ing streets. You will never block me ... do you hear me. I will drive to Joburg and take your ass and will show you what I am capable of.”
The caller berates the woman for doubting his intelligence, telling her that he is having her followed.
“I have a tracker on you … Do you think I don’t know what you are doing … I will kill you and him. I will f…ing murder both of you.”
When the woman questions the caller over who he is talking about, she is warned that she is being tracked 24/7.
“I know everything.”
“I know what my sister sounds like when [she is] backed into a corner. That is her voice. That is how she sounds when she is confronted.
“The voice note is genuine. That is Thabo Bester. I know his voice. It is exactly how he sounds.”
Sekeleni described Bester as having a bad temper, resorting to violence without hesitation.
He said while he had not managed to speak to his sister, he was talking to people who were in contact with her.
“The message I have conveyed is that I am there for her, in whatever way she needs support, just as I have been supporting my father.
“I told her if she needs anything to keep her safe I will help her. That is my sister and as much as whatever happened she must know that I will help her in any way that she needs help — be it with the law, funds etc.”
He described his family, and his sister and father as simple people.
“We are making headlines and we are not a family that makes headlines. We are a simple family, Nandipha is a very simple person, the way I know her.”
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