JOHANNESBURG– Alleged hitman Musa Kekana has told the Johannesburg High Court that a police commander knelt on his back and pulled a plastic courier bag over his head five times, until he lost consciousness and came round coughing up blood.
Kekana, accused number one in the case against alleged underworld figure Vusimuzi “Cat” Matlala, took the stand on Tuesday in the trial-within-a-trial that will decide whether evidence obtained after his arrest in April 2024 can be used against him and his co-accused.
Testifying through an interpreter and led by his advocate, Riaan Gissing, Kekana named two senior officers who testified for the state, Tactical Response Team commander Captain Pimi Sekgobela and Lieutenant Colonel Tumelo Tsotetsi, as being present during the alleged torture. Both have denied that Kekana was assaulted.
Kekana told Judge Cassim Moosa that he had driven to a friend’s property on 8th Road for help with a tyre when police vehicles arrived with sirens and blue lights.
“When the police arrived, there were police officers that were shouting for us to disembark the motor vehicle that we were in, and there were police officers that fired shots,” he said.
“Police said we must disembark the vehicle. We disembarked the vehicle. They said we must raise our hands. We raised our hands, and they also … instructed us to lie down, and we lay down on the grass,” he explained.
He said that Sekgobela searched him, handcuffed his hands behind his back, lifted him by his T-shirt and the cuffs, and placed him in the boot of a white Toyota Fortuner.
“No one explained my rights to me,” Kekana said. Asked whether he was told he was under arrest, he replied: “No, he, on his arrival, he just handcuffed me and then he took me to the car,” he said.
He said he had told the officer he was a sickly person. “Not that I was sick, but I was afraid of being assaulted.”
Kekana said he was driven to his home, where Sekgobela told him to open the gate.
“I then informed him that I do not have the keys. The keys were left behind in the vehicle that I was driving, the V-Class.”
He said he heard Sekgobela send one officer back to fetch the keys and tell another to open the gate manually.
Asked whether police sought permission to enter the property, Kekana said: “No permission was sought from me.” Asked whether he had granted it, he said: “No, I did not.” He gave the same answers about the search of the cars in his yard and the search of the house.
His evidence directly contradicts that of state witness Sergeant Mayisela Ledwaba, who testified that Kekana consented to the search and produced the keys himself.
Kekana said that inside the house, Sekgobela took him to a bedroom.
“When we arrived in the bedroom, he made me kneel down and then said to me he’s looking for firearms,” he said.
“I denied any knowledge of firearms. He then took a duvet that was on the bed and covered me with it,” he continued.
Kekana said the captain then threatened to shoot him in the head. “So I kept quiet and I did a little prayer because I thought I leaving this world,” he told the court.
He said he was assaulted from behind, and that he believed it was other officers, as there were two police officers, including Sekgobela in the room with him. He said he was then lifted and taken to the lounge, still covered with the duvet.
“On arrival at the lounge, I was still being punched all over my body, and they were still saying I must give them firearms.”
Kekana said Sekgobela then removed the duvet and told him he must hand over “the firearms that I used to kill the white person”, an apparent reference to the 2024 murder of Vereeniging engineer Armand Swart, for which Kekana was arrested.
When he again denied any knowledge, Kekana said, the captain said he would show him.
“He took my belt, made me lie on the floor on my stomach, and then took the belt and tied it on my legs and my hands at the back.”
He said Sekgobela was holding a Courier Guy plastic bag.
“I then felt him putting his knee on my back and placing the plastic bag over my head,” Kekana said. “The placing of the bag over my head was suffocating me,” he said. Asked what was done with the bag, he said: “He’d tighten at my back to prevent air from entering.”
Kekana said this was done three to four times. “On the fourth occasion that he placed the Courier Guy bag over my head, when he took it out, I then became unconscious because when I came to, I was on the floor,” he said.
Asked whether anything was said to him during the suffocation, he said: “At the time, there was many things that Sekgobela was saying, and I was agreeing to whatever that he was saying.”
He said the captain then accused him of making a fool of him and placed the bag over his head a fifth time.
“That’s when I couldn’t breathe. I then kicked out. My belt snapped and I coughed and that’s when I started coughing up blood,” Kekana said.
“Because I was going out of breath, I started kicking, trying to breathe. I fainted before I started coughing up blood,” he added.
Kekana said that while he was coughing up blood and struggling to breathe, an officer, Colonel Tsetetsi next to him said: “Had you given us the firearms, you wouldn’t be in this situation.”
He said Tsotetsi told him to take off his bloodstained T-shirt. “I was then given another black T-shirt and told to wipe off the blood. I then asked him to fetch my nebuliser in the bedroom,” he said, adding that he was told a paramedic had been called.
“While we were still at the house, after I had changed, I was then cuffed, but from my front, not the back,” he explained.
He said that Tsotetsi then said they had to leave because he was wanted back at 8th Road.
Tsotetsi previously testified that Kekana’s rights were explained in Sepedi and English, and that officers moved his handcuffs to the front because Kekana was coughing and said he had recently been in hospital. Asked on Tuesday whether he had told police he had been admitted to hospital, Kekana said: “No.”
Kekana is on trial with Matlala, Matlala’s wife Tsakane Matlala, Tiego Floyd Mabusela and Nthabiseng Nzama. The five face 25 charges, including attempted murder linked to incidents involving actress Tebogo Thobejane and taxi boss Joe “Ferrari” Sibanyoni.
On Monday, the defence called C-Track consultant Eric Deysel to testify on police vehicle-tracking records from the day of the arrest.
The trial-within-a-trial does not decide guilt. All the accused are presumed innocent, and Kekana’s allegations have not yet been tested in cross-examination.
Kekana’s evidence-in-chief continues.
