JOHANNESBURG – Alleged hitman Musa Kekana has accused a state witness of lying about seeing him drive a Hyundai i20 on the morning of his arrest, as the state began cross-examining him in the trial-within-a-trial at the Johannesburg High Court on Tuesday.
Kekana, accused number one in the trial of alleged underworld figure Vusimuzi “Cat” Matlala, testified earlier in the day that police suffocated him with a plastic bag during his arrest on 17 April 2024.
The trial-within-a-trial will decide whether evidence obtained after the arrest is admissible.
Under cross-examination by prosecutor Elize le Roux, Kekana confirmed that Michael Pule Tau, an accused in a separate matter, was with him that morning.
He said Tau had been at his house the night before, when a woman arrived and left her car in his yard. He said Tau and the woman then drove off in Kekana’s Mercedes-Benz Viano and returned “just after 3 o’clock” on the morning of 17 April, after which she left and Tau slept on his couch.
Kekana said that when he came out of his bedroom that morning, Tau told him that co-accused Tiego Floyd Mabusela was stuck with a flat tyre and a damaged rim.
Kekana said he then phoned David Matlou, who fixes his cars, to ask for a rim.
He insisted the call was made after 8am. The State put to him that Matlou, a defence witness, testified that he had told Kekana he needed to leave at 8am for his child’s tombstone unveiling at West Park Cemetery.
“There is no way that he can say… he wanted to leave at 8 because it was already after 8,” Kekana said.
The State then turned to the evidence of the state’s first witness in the trial-within-a-trial, a CAP Security employee who testified that he was watching Kekana’s house from about 170 metres away.
Kekana conceded he could not dispute this. “I wouldn’t know. I did not see him and I did not look at people that were on the road,” he said.
The witness testified that he saw Kekana and Tau arrive at the house in the i20, belonging to Kekana’s tenant, and later leave in the Viano with Kekana driving.
He said that after the arrest, he walked up and pointed the two men out to police.
Kekana said he saw the i20 arrive that morning while he was in his bedroom, and thought his tenant was driving it, but did not know how many people were inside.
He also denied being in the car. He said he did not see the witness at the scene. “Maybe he was there because there were many police officers there, but the part that he came and pointed me out, no, I’m denying the part,” he said.
Asked whether he was suggesting the witness had been told what to say, Kekana first said: “No, that’s not what I’m saying.”
He later added: “Maybe he was there. But I did not see him. Maybe he was told to.”
When the state put to him that the witness had no reason to invent his evidence, Kekana said the witness “came and lied and said he saw me driving the I-20”.
He said that although the witness worked for a private security company, “he works closely with the police.”
The State also put to Kekana that the witness confirmed police evidence that Kekana had told officers not to manhandle him because he was sick.
Kekana said he told police he was “a doctor’s patient” and they should handle him gently, but that he was not on any treatment.
“I said that because I was afraid of being assaulted by the police, so to prevent it, I said that,” he said.
The State said this tied in with notes by two doctors at Edenvale Hospital on the day of his arrest, which both record Kekana complaining of a two-week cough.
Kekana said: “I don’t recall telling the doctors about a two week cough.”
Questioned about the nebuliser he asked police to fetch during the search, Kekana said he bought it during the Covid pandemic for family members, and had used it only once, to test it.
He said police allowed him to use it because “there was blood dripping across my mouth,” he explained.
Asked what kind of poisoning led to his hospital admission on 3 March 2024.
Kekana said: “I don’t know. I fainted.”
He said he was told it was poisoning “I was told that they are things that were drained out of my system,” he said.
When the State began questioning him on another entry from the March admission, the defence objected.
Kekana’s advocate, Riaan Gissing, argued that the admission, about five weeks before the arrest, had no link to what Kekana told doctors on 17 April, and was irrelevant.
Another defence counsel, Annelene Van de Heever argued that the hospital entries were unproven hearsay because their authors had not been called, and that the court could not rely on unproven medical notes.
The State argued that the full hospital file was handed in by the defence without any conditions, and that the March records went to Kekana’s credibility.
Judge Cassim Moosa asked the parties to submit their case law on Wednesday morning before he rules on the objection.
Kekana’s cross-examination will continue after the ruling.
Kekana is on trial with Matlala, Tsakane Matlala, Mabusela and Nthabiseng Nzama.
