Tenderpreneur and attempted murder accused Vusimuzi “Cat” Matlala has accused Bheki Cele of lying and claimed he had given the former police minister R500,000 in cash.
Matlala told the parliamentary ad hoc committee sitting at the Kgosi Mampuru Prison, where he’s incarcerated, that he had stopped giving Cele money because he wouldn’t stop asking for it.
The committee is investigating allegations of criminality and corruption in the criminal justice system.
Matlala alleged that he had met KwaZulu-Natal provincial commissioner Lt-Gen Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi at The Pearls of Umhlanga in April and that the meeting was facilitated by Cele to secure help from Mkhwanazi regarding Matlala’s R360m police health service contract.
Cele was asked by the ad hoc committee last month why he had met Matlala, and he said he was trying to get information from him.
But Matlala on Wednesday dismissed this as a lie. “Yes, he [Cele] lied under oath,” he told the committee.
“If he was asking for information from me, why would he even ask me to tell my protectors to take him and his wife to a wedding somewhere [in Muldersdrift, Krugersdorp]... There was no way, from me sending my protectors to drive him to this wedding, that he would get information from those guys. He doesn’t even know them.
“If he wanted information, he was supposed to make sure at the time that I was with him, so he could get it directly from me. But it was for his own benefit. I even gave him money.”
Matlala said he gave Cele R300,000 cash at his penthouse in Pretoria and R200,000 at the Beverly Hills hotel in KwaZulu-Natal. “And if he says he was only there to get information — did he declare anywhere that I gave him that money?”
He said he gave Cele cash because Cele had told him he had helped him but was not showing his appreciation. He said Cele arranged a meeting for him and Mkhwanazi after telling Cele about the problems he had with his police contract.
He told MPs that Cele had helped him get his firearms back after his residence was raided. Cele, Matlala said, then asked for money and reminded him of what he did for him.
He said he began to view Cele’s demands for money as extortion and stopped making payments and also stopped taking his calls in May.
He was later arrested.
Matlala said he kept giving controversial North West businessman Brown Mogotsi money because Cele told him to keep entertaining him. He said he believes his arrest for the attempted murder of his former girlfriend, actor Tebogo Thobejane, was a direct consequence of no longer giving Cele and Mogotsi money.
Earlier, Matlala told the committee he would not answer questions that might incriminate him in relation to the cancelled R360m police healthcare contract. But MPs reminded him that under the Powers, Privileges, and Immunities of Parliament and Provincial Legislatures Act, evidence given before the committee cannot be used against him in criminal proceedings, except for perjury.
ANC MP Khusela Diko-Sangoni said she was “disturbed” by his refusal to respond despite the immunities explained to him, while evidence leader Adv Norman Arendse pressed that the committee was entitled to probe procurement irregularities and his role in the tender award.
Matlala confirmed he was the sole shareholder of Medicare24 Tshwane District, the entity awarded the contract, but resigned as a director in December 2024 without notifying the police. He acknowledged that the contract was cancelled after audit findings of irregularities and that the Investigating Directorate Against Corruption was probing the matter.
The committee questioned him on his links to the Tembisa Hospital procurement scandal, where the Special Investigating Unit has an open inquiry docket on his association with taxi boss Jotham Msibi, described in the Madlanga commission as part of the “Big Five” syndicate.
Matlala admitted to providing security services to Msibi until his death in January 2024 but denied any relationship with murder‑accused businessman Katiso “KT” Molefe.
Molefe’s name was also raised in the corruption scandal.
Matlala said he had been introduced to the Medicare group by a neighbour Mike van Wyk, and acknowledged that he had attempted to buy the entire holding company.
Matlala repeatedly expressed concern that investigators could use his testimony indirectly, saying: “I’m being chased today by the law that is protecting me.”
Sowetan
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