The risky business of moving Cat Matlala and Thabo Bester to supermax prison

Politically connected tenderpreneur Vusimusi “Cat” Matlala and murderer and serial rapist Thabo Bester are languishing in one of the world’s most secure prisons — yet their recent transfer to the eBongweni Super Maximum Correctional Facility in Kokstad, KwaZulu-Natal, may have inadvertently made them a bigger flight risk.

Lawyers and prison experts have questioned the logic of holding awaiting-trial prisoners hundreds of kilometres from the courts where their cases are being heard.

The eBongweni prison is roughly 700km from the Johannesburg high court, where Matlala and his four co-accused are facing 25 charges, including 11 of attempted murder. It is about 600km from the Bloemfontein high court, where Bester is on trial for his dramatic May 2022 escape from the Mangaung Correctional Centre.

“Transport from prison to court is always a risk,” said criminologist and forensic investigations expert Prof Rudolph Zinn. “Particularly in this country, where soft-bodied vehicles are used because correctional services doesn’t have armoured trucks. They can easily be led into an ambush.”

Just after midnight a few days before Christmas, Matlala was loaded into a prison vehicle without warning and driven out of Kgosi Mampuru II C-Max prison in Pretoria. By dawn, he was being admitted to eBongweni — South Africa’s most secure prison, designed to hold the country’s most dangerous convicts.

Weeks later, Bester followed, transferred from the maximum security Mangaung Correctional Centre in Bloemfontein.

Such decisions are informed by comprehensive security risk assessments and inmate classification processes

—  Singabakho Nxumalo, DCS spokesperson

Critics argue the moves signal a troubling expansion of the state’s harshest incarceration regime — one never intended for inmates still fighting their cases in court.

The department of correctional services (DCS) insists the transfers were routine, justified and carried out for the prisoners’ own safety. “Such decisions are informed by comprehensive security risk assessments and inmate classification processes,” said DCS spokesperson Singabakho Nxumalo.

He said inmate movements, including court appearances, were managed “through established protocols in co-operation with relevant justice and security stakeholders” and were planned to mitigate risks while ensuring cost-effective use of state resources.

Nxumalo insisted the transfers did not increase escape risks. “On the contrary, such facilities are designed to manage inmates assessed as high risk.”

He said he could not reveal any details on how Bester and Matlala would be transported to their court hearings.

In January, the Sunday Times reported that Matlala’s transfer had followed fears that at least one senior correctional services official in Pretoria might be too close to him.

“It was found that there seem to be links between the top official and Matlala,” a source in the department told the Sunday Times. “When Matlala was found with a cellphone last year, it seems he could have received it from a senior official. In addition, Matlala has been receiving too many visits at the [Pretoria] prison, since remand inmates have unlimited visits, unlike convicted inmates, so he had to be moved.

“Many of the officials working at C-Max are from Mamelodi, and that makes [Matlala] a security risk because he can easily get favours. This means the department doesn’t trust employed officials.”

Another source said a senior official was now under investigation.

Other sources in the department said Matlala was moved due to the possibility of attempts to kill him. Matlala himself is said to have feared someone might try to poison his food in jail.

“There was intel received that Matlala’s life was at risk, and that is why he had to be transferred,” one source said.

But Nxumalo dismissed this account as false.

On Friday Matlala’s advocate, Annelene van den Heever, told the Johannesburg high court he had been “spirited away without warning” at midnight on December 21. She said holding Matlala 700km from the court in which he is standing trial severely disrupted his right to consult with his legal team, forcing her to fly to Durban and then drive three hours to the prison.

The court has sympathy for your frustrations, but the state and correctional services have their reasons and are entitled to make such decisions

—  Judge William Karam to Matlala’s advocate Annelene van den Heever

Van den Heever told the court she had written and hand-delivered two requests to correctional services national commissioner Makgothi Thobakgale, asking for Matlala to be transferred back to C-Max, but had received no response.

Judge William Karam responded that the court would not be drawn into the issue. “The court has sympathy for your frustrations, but the state and correctional services have their reasons and are entitled to make such decisions,” Karam said.

Prosecutor Elize le Roux said the state had been fair in facilitating Matlala’s access to his lawyers, noting that consultations had taken place earlier in the week at C-Max in Pretoria.

Addressing a packed courtroom — with black-clad, rifle-toting special guards sporting sunglasses stationed strategically — Van den Heever asked for proceedings to stand down so she could take instructions from her client.

Karam warned the consultation would take place in a small underground room — “just four walls and a door, with no windows, where you will be locked in with 100 guards standing outside”.

“That’s ideal, my lord. Thank you,” Van den Heever replied.

Zinn said the supermax prison was never intended to house awaiting-trial inmates and was therefore not built near any court. He also criticised supermax incarceration for its reliance on near-total isolation, with inmates locked in small cells for up to 23 hours a day.

“It offers no chance of rehabilitation,” he said. “You breed hostile individuals with mental damage.”

You end up with a situation where a person can say, ‘I’m innocent, but you’re punishing me for security risks because you can’t do your job. You’re taking away my rights for things that aren’t my fault’

—  Prof Lukas Muntingh, prison reform expert

According to the Judicial Inspectorate for Correctional Services’ 2021 report on solitary confinement, authored by inspecting judge Edwin Cameron, supermax incarceration is characterised by near-total isolation and is therefore unlawful. The report found that confining individuals to single cells with minimal human contact meets the internationally recognised definition of solitary confinement.

Nxumalo rejected this characterisation, saying there was no solitary confinement within the correctional system.

“The department operates in line with the constitution, the Correctional Services Act and applicable regulations,” he said. “Any restricted housing arrangements are subject to strict legal safeguards and oversight mechanisms and are not punitive in nature.”

Prof Lukas Muntingh, a leading prison reform expert, strongly disagreed, arguing that maximum-security facilities were never intended for long-term incarceration and were increasingly being used as punishment — particularly for awaiting-trial inmates like Matlala.

He said the greatest risk factors in any prison system were staff and the transport of prisoners in and out of facilities.

“When C-Max was first conceived, the idea was to remove disruptive prisoners temporarily, reduce violence and then return them to the general population,” Muntingh said. Instead, some inmates had been held in isolation for as long as nine years — “illegal and a clear violation of human rights”.

Correctional services, he said, was obliged to detain high-profile prisoners while still upholding their right to a fair and speedy trial.

“Yet despite critiques from academics, inspecting judges and activists, they persist in their superficial use of concepts and then get defensive when questioned.”

Muntingh said South Africa was unusual in having a dedicated minister of correctional services — a structure he said opened the door to politicisation.

“You end up with a situation where a person can say, ‘I’m innocent, but you’re punishing me for security risks because you can’t do your job. You’re taking away my rights for things that aren’t my fault’.”