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In the latest edition of the NdB Sunday Show, Chris Steyn and Safe Citizen Founder Jonathan Deal take a deep dive into the latest testimony at the Madlanga Commission of Inquiry after 159 days of testimony. “I think that we could say that this week the Madlanga Commission stopped being about one scandal and started looking like a stress test of the entire institution of the South African Police Services… because we have five threats all moving at once: Credibility collapse for the woman who ran IDAC, a classified report that moved through the system with nobody able to say under what authority, an EFF leader the commission still has not called, a shooting victim the public doesn’t fully believe was shot, and two witnesses – one sealed and one postponed still to come.” Deal also outlines why Special Leave Police Minister Senzo Mchunu can now be safely referred to as former Police Minister: “…this stuff sounds like it’s out of a spy novel, quite frankly…. the Inspector General of Intelligence is refusing to hand over a report on an open investigation. All of a sudden, the report is in the hands of the Minister of Police and that gets flown – literally like we see on the movies with spies moving documents around – to the Eastern Cape…and forwarded on WhatsApp…Absolutely mind boggling.”
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Edited transcript of the interview
Chris Steyn (00:01.004)
Welcome to the NdB Sunday Show with me, Chris Steyn and Jonathan Deal, the founder of Safe Citizen. Morning, Jonathan.
Jonathan Deal (00:10.901)
Good morning to you, Chris.
Chris Steyn (00:13.614)
159 days of the Madlanga Commission of Inquiry. Go with me, let’s take a deep dive. Why does this week matter in particular?
Jonathan Deal (00:27.009)
Chris, I think that what I’d like to do is preface what our discussion will be this morning with a very appropriate quote from Ian Cameron at the recent BizNews conference. And Ian said that, without a functional, trusted police force, economic security and public safety in South Africa will remain fundamentally compromised. And I think that that really frames what this entire Madlanga Commission is about and the difference that perhaps the Madlanga Commission could make for the nation.
I think that we could say that this week the Madlanga Commission stopped being about one scandal and started looking like a stress test of the entire institution of the South African Police Services.
And I say that because we have five threats all moving at once. Credibility collapse for the women who ran IDAC. A classified report that moved through the system with nobody able to say under what authority. An EFF leader the commission still has not called. A shooting victim the public doesn’t fully believe was shot. And two witnesses, one sealed and one postponed still to come.
So there’s a lot still in the pipeline.
Chris Steyn (01:49.794)
Quite, let’s go to who police the police. We’ve heard a great deal about the unfettered power of former IDAC chief Andrea Johnson.
Jonathan Deal (01:59.973)
In fact, I was at one stage perplexed as to how one person can have so much power over the South African police services and literally reach so deep into so many areas of it.
Watching her testimony, she’s adept at speaking to people. She was looking directly into the camera at all times, no blinking, no shifty evasiveness. Anybody not understanding the evidence behind Andrea Johnson would have thought this woman is very sure of her facts. And it looks to me like she’s telling the truth. She’s just an expert at it.
But to come back to the control of IDAC, it was only three weeks before the 1st of August when the Sunday Times, at the same time that the Sunday Times ran an editorial about Andrea Johnson and her unfettered reign, that Judge T. Raulinga was appointed.
And interestingly enough, it is the responsibility of the NPA and the Department of Justice to recommend candidates like Andrea Johnson to the President. It has then been argued by the NPA and the Department of Justice that whoever replaces Johnson must be someone whose probity is beyond question. That implies, in fact, that they realise that they did a substandard or possibly did a substandard job with her.
And Chris, this is basically, I think, the same pattern that killed The Scorpions. South Africa seems to have a habit of standing up powerful commissions and task teams and departments to…do things that are an absolutely critical function and not vetting them properly and controlling them properly from day one.
So just a caution around Johnson, and in fact, I think this goes for any person that we will mention on the show today. None of these allegations are adjudicated findings yet. And so we will frame them all as commission evidence and editorial argument rather than established fact.
Chris Steyn (04:20.621)
Let’s look at the alleged layer of political interference.
Jonathan Deal (04:26.986)
So with Johnson particularly, her credibility is at stake because of a number of allegations. The first one is at the Ad Hoc Committee: She said that she’d only authorise the Matlala Medicare 24 tender after receiving Fadiel Adams’ Section 27 affidavit, which she claimed arrived mid-December 2024. But commission evidence shows she’d already authorised the investigation on the 6th of December. So strike one. Commissioner Baloyi himself actually called the sequence improbable.
Secondly, her separate contradiction at the Ad Hoc Committee, she denied knowing Adams had referred the matter via the Police Minister’s office and at the commission she admitted her office did receive the referral and that she personally instructed the investigator of IDAC Dylan Perumal to go and solicit an affidavit from Adams.
And basically it almost points out that or looks as if she’s claiming that Adams contacted IDAC when it was actually the other way around.
And so it’s not one contradiction, it’s two. And parliament is now asking whether either one was a crime.
On the political interference layer, we have an ex-Minister at this stage, I think I could probably safely refer to him as ex-Minister Mchunu and Johnson.
The chief investigator, Advocate Drushantha Ramsamy, testified that the Mchunu-Johnson contact is not a once-off or was not a once-off meet and greet, as was finally admitted by Johnson.
She routinely updated Mchunu on IDAC’s process investigating Crime Intelligence, which falls under his own Ministry. And IDAC’s own head of investigations, Matthews Sesoko, called it simply odd for IDAC to be reporting to Mchuna at all on an inactive investigation touching his department.
Jonathan Deal (06:40.896)
The irony is that it was Mchunu who referred the original Crime Intelligence allocations to the Inspector General of Intelligence early in 2025. And so he was on both ends of this, one as the minister kicked off the probe and the alleged recipient of confidential updates on it.
And then this was for me a real clincher. Johnson’s own position is moved from denying that the January meeting occurred, this is in front of everybody, in front of evidence, all denying that the meeting occurred, then finally admitting that it happened, then insisting nothing of substance was discussed.
And so her pattern of deny, admit and minimize is I think a pattern that we are seeing with Andrea Johnson and the Madlanga Commission is not finished with her. It’s worth watching for it again in the new testimony.
Chris Steyn (07:37.793)
Jonathan, meanwhile, the Classified Report delay.
Jonathan Deal (07:42.977)
This was really, really interesting and it’s probably the sharpest new detail out of our whole week.
So in January 2025, the Inspector General of Intelligence explicitly refused to hand IDAC a report on its own Crime Intelligence investigation, citing the case as still being open. But around September 2025, suspended chief investigator Dylan Perumal tells Ramsamy that Mchunu personally arranged for someone to fly a hard copy of that still classified report to him in the Eastern Cape.
So imagine this, this stuff sounds like it’s out of a spy novel, quite frankly…. the Inspector General of Intelligence is refusing to hand over a report on an open investigation. All of a sudden, the report is in the hands of the Minister of Police and that gets flown – literally like we see on the movies with spies – moving documents around to the Eastern Cape. And that was bypassing the IGI’s refusal entirely to hand that over.
Maybe for the audience, it’s useful to understand that the Intelligence Department oversees all of the Justice Cluster departments. It overlooks IDAC, the police, everybody else. So the Inspector General of Intelligence is a very high position and the fact that Minister Mchunu allegedly was able to get his hands on a copy of this report and allegedly send it to the Eastern Cape is significant. Then it was that Perumal then forwarded it to Ramsamyi on WhatsApp. Can you believe it? The report then moves on WhatsApp.
And so it’s a classified report that the intelligence watchdog refused to release, flown across the country and forwarded on WhatsApp. And nobody can say under what authority that happened. Absolutely mind boggling.
Chris Steyn (09:47.885)
So is the R700,000 forklift.
Jonathan Deal (09:52.459)
Well, this, I think is also a really useful angle because there’s so much going on in around the Madlanga Commission and the Parliamentary Ad Hoc Committee that I think that the average person in the public, if they don’t have time to study this and watch all the testimony and read all the news reports and so on, can find it a bit confusing.
But in terms of for the public just to understand the thread that people can actually hold in their hand, it’s a question about a specific amount of R700,000 and testimony from Ramsamy on August the 5th ties the alleged forklift procurement scam over 700,000 to the KwaZulu Natal Political Killings Task Team. We’re going to hear more about that later. Using Crime Intelligence secret funds – and have we not heard in past years about secret funds of Crime Intelligence and the police being misused more than once.
So we don’t know at this stage who actually sold the forklifts and who signed off the tender. And that’s an open question that I would, the public I’m sure would like to know. But what is new and sharper is that Rumamyi has reframed Minister Mchunu as having a particular interest in the forklift matter and specifically that the witness that he arranged to fly to the Eastern Cape was relevant to the procurement of the forklift by Crime Intelligence. And at a January 22nd meeting apparently with Mchunu, Johnson agreed that she would drop the matter, the forklift matter. She agreed it with Minister Mchunu. This is the evidence or the testimony that has been led, which actually she didn’t.
And I think that the bottom line, we could summarize that in saying two forklifts, R700,000 rand Crime Intelligence secret funds and a minister who, according to sworn testimony, took a particular interest in exactly this one.
Chris Steyn (11:58.99)
Jonathan over to Economic Freedom Fighters Commander in Chief Julius Malema’s What’sUp chats.
Jonathan Deal (12:08.512)
Well, I think Julius Malema, from my viewpoint, is trying to soft-soap this and make it appear less than what it is. But actually, WhatsApp chats extracted from Feroz Khan’s phone in 2020 to 2023 via tobacco businessman Muhammed Sayed, allege that Khan and Malema coordinated to remove then Inspector General of Intelligence…that Khan gave Malema confidential case information he wasn’t entitled to as a parliamentarian or just as a South African and… investigators characterisation that Malema provided political protection for Feroz Khan.
There’s also a funding relationship thread linking Adriano Mazzotti’s Carnilinx tobacco company via Sayed and I think Malema’s actual defense precisely is that he cannot confirm the authenticity of these chats, only they can, presumably referring to Khan and others. And Malema wants to frame anything that he received from Khan as ordinary parliamentary oversight of public officials.
Now there was a commentary by an analyst …who rebutted this and he says the messages also prove that Malema was seeking personal favours through Khan not just oversight related information and that undercuts Malema’s official business defense.
Chris Steyn (13:49.271)
Why do you think Malema has not been called?
Jonathan Deal (13:52.853)
I think the honest answer there is that the Commission might not have arrived at that point yet. A Commission spokesman has said that the decision will rest with the Commission’s evidence leaders and that they are determined to ensure everyone implicated is treated fairly.
So I think if I had to summarise it, the Commission is saying it’s really about fairness to everyone implicated and the EFF, of course, is claiming that it’s something else.
As of this week at this stage nobody outside of the Commission actually knows which and we will have to wait and see if Malema is eventually called.
Chris Steyn (14:33.537)
Let’s talk about his good friend, General Feroz Khan, who’s gone from case symbol to shooting victim.
Jonathan Deal (14:41.768)
Yeah, I think that it’s useful also just to establish in this whole scheme of things who Khan is. He’s the major general at the center of the WhatsApp chats allegations with Malema and Mo Sayed. And on the 28th of June, he was shot. There was a lot of skepticism about that initially. Social media broadcasters and podcasters speculated that Khan hadn’t really been shot or that the incident was staged to avoid testifying. I think even you and I were a little bit skeptical the last time we spoke.
However, there is a medical record now from a trauma surgeon’s report. And the trauma surgeon describes a single gunshot wound to the abdomen, multiple perforations of the small intestine, a lot of blood in the lower cavity, bullet lodged very near the spine and actually a very serious injury indeed. And the surgeon that attended this actually went so far as to say that it’s unlikely that somebody would voluntarily incur an injury of this nature for secondary gain. So while the skepticism was real and loud, the medical record that has come out basically argues hard in the opposite direction.
Chris Steyn (16:06.605)
So there is another appearance that has still not taken place, that of the tenderpreneur and attempted murder accused Cat Matlala. Postponed again, but there is the paper trail.
Jonathan Deal (16:23.294)
I think probably one of the most intriguing characters around this thing and the one that the public would really most like to see interviewed on the commission. His testimony, Cat Matlala, has now been postponed twice, most recently to the 1st of September. And this is after his lawyer, Annelien van den Heevere, has argued that testifying before the commission while he is being tried on a separate criminal matter would prejudice his fair trial rights in that matter. So we can understand that.
And of course, his attorney is also separately now seeking IDAC material relevant to his collapsed plea deal. The Madlangta Commission has granted the delay, but ordered him to file a written statement by the 29th of June, which was done. And although he hasn’t appeared in person, there’s now reportedly a paper record of his allegations sitting with the commission.
Chris Steyn (17:22.977)
Witness M sealed for five weeks.
Jonathan Deal (17:24.638)
Yeah, this again is another intriguing thing. And I had an idle thought that if we see what happened to, I think it was Witness D who was assassinated, it must be an enormous strain and stress for the members of the Madlanga Commission, the commissioners themselves to actually manage this information, to sit on top of information like this, to have evidence or access to this testimony and to not be able to speak about it to anybody and to understand what is going on in the whole picture.
And I think it’s probably a good time now again to just say how much everybody I think in the nation, other than those that are implicated in these issues, really appreciates the professionalism of the way that they do things.
But Witness M has been testifying behind closed doors since the 7th to 8th of July, and particularly around what is known as around one of the major 2021 cocaine busts.
But we have five weeks behind closed doors and counting. We genuinely don’t know what’s in it, and neither as far as the public record shows does anybody outside the room.
Chris Steyn (18:54.541)
Jonathan, what to watch before next week?
Jonathan Deal (18:58.482)
Well, there are three big things. Mchunu is expected back before the commission for further round part three. And what’s intriguing me, Chris, absolutely intriguing me, given the evidence that has come out from a number of sources under oath, is that Minister Mchunu is still flat out denying any knowledge of any of these meetings with Johnson, anything to do with the forklift report, anything to do literally with anything in front of the Madlanga Commission. Absolutely amazing.
And before I get on to those three dates, I just want to say that the other thing that was opened in this last week, which we will certainly probably speak about, is what the Political Killings Task Teams were on about. What’s come out of there from IPID investigators and assassinations: Police officers being paid up to two and a half million rand to assassinate a rival tow truck operator.
So all of that evidence is in development. But the three dates to watch are Mchunus part three, Matlala’s September the first appearance, and of course, whatever Parliament decides is going to happen with Andrea Johnson. It really is exciting stuff.
Chris Steyn (20:28.289)
Let’s also talk about the KZN Hit Squad phase.
Jonathan Deal (20:35.092)
I don’t have the numbers very much offhand, but I think it was around 149 people killed over around 111 incidents. It’s been suggested by an IPID investigator that the police, certain of the heads of the tow truck, the tow truck…that the Political Killings Task Team, the Cash-in-Transit Task Team and the Taxi Task Team would have very close connections with some underworld characters and would come to arrangements with these underworld characters literally, this is the allegation to eliminate the competition of the people in those various fields of endeavour, let’s call them
The one that particularly came to mind was around a tow truck operator in KwaZulu-Natal…And the police in charge of that, apparently, that tow truck operator, the task team were offered R2.5 million to eliminate this rival tow truck operator. He found out about it and he actually phoned, I think it was either the tow truck operator that called the hit on him or the police and said that he was aware of this and this is what was happened and he was actually taking them to task on it. His father approached the High Court for an interdict a day before he was assassinated to stop the police from assassinating his son. And that came out in…in this evidence.
What also came out from the IPID investigator was that they would come across scenes that they investigated where there would be nine dead people. And with the nine dead people were three firearms. But the police report would claim that they were fired on by all of the people that they were trying to arrest. Sometimes, according to the IPID investigator, there were no firearms in evidence. He said that the reporting of the police was so sort of…
Jonathan Deal (22:52.316)
…slapdas: that after the events they hadn’t even recorded the names of the people that they had shot in these incidents.
So, chilling and intriguing at the same time. Can you imagine? And I’m not saying anybody was or wasn’t a legitimate business person, but can you imagine being a legitimate business person that starts interrupting the profit line of somebody who’s prepared to go to those lengths and all of a sudden you and your family can just be assassinated.
It really is a very serious situation and I think it brings us back to Ian Cameron’s quote that until we’ve got a functional and trusted police force, the economic security and public safety in this country is going to be fundamentally compromised.
Chris Steyn (23:46.348)
Yeah, after 159 days, Jonathan, it does seem as though we have come full circle back to that press conference by the KZN Provincial Commissioner of Police..
Jonathan Deal (23:58.898)
Absolutely. He has been, I think he’s been thoroughly vindicated.
I must say that one thing that disturbed me a little bit this week when I was reading this information about those Political Killings Task teams was that perhaps at the time that those teams were operating, were they de facto under his overall and holistic command and control? And did he know about them?
Personally, I like the man. I think that South Africa owes him a debt of gratitude for scratching, kicking this can of worms over. And I will be delighted if there is strong daylight between him and those Political Killings Task teams and what they did.
Chris Steyn (24:49.558)
Thank you, that was Jonathan Deal, the founder of Safe Citizen on the NdB Sunday Show with me, Chris Steyn. Thank you, Jonathan.
Jonathan Deal (24:59.53)
Thank you, Chris.
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