As news about the arrest of fugitive Facebook murderer Thabo Bester and socialite doctor girlfriend Nandipha Magudumana spread on the Easter weekend, the response to the police minister’s hastily convened official announcement of the development was one of continued disbelief.
“Was Bheki Cele drunk?”, “Bheki Cele at his finest”, “Foreign nationals are showing us flames”, “Tanzania authorities found them during the night, while SAPS would have been drunk, no vans available to assist, so give credit to Tanzania police” were among the responses to what was described as a cabinet minister’s “bungling on national TV”.
While Bester and Magudumana sat behind bars in Tanzania, their arrest and the role of South Africa’s police crime intelligence was called into question, prompting a hastily convened media briefing by police minister Cele.
Cele was quick to praise SAPS crime intelligence, saying South African operatives had been on the tails of the fugitives and had them arrested on Friday night shortly after they left their hotel in Dar es Salaam.
“Our forces, with the assistance of Interpol and crime intelligence, have been working on the Bester case. [Bester and Magudumana] were spotted leaving their hotel in a black SUV by people who were working on the case. They followed and found them with a Mozambican national and found various passports on them,” said Cele.
These claims were rubbished by senior police sources who said the arrests were “sheer chance” and took place at a routine police roadblock on the road to the Kenya border.
Denials and arrogance continue as disbelieving followers of the story guffaw and shake their heads.
This is a strong indictment, particularly since it is the single success and positive development in the saga playing out like a poorly plotted crime caper in which the police and correctional services look like clowns.
A fire inside a prison cell, a burnt body, a death certificate reflecting no ID number, the passing of months before the brazen escape was even detected (after the astounding discovery that the incinerated body was of man shorter than the tall inmate-gone-missing). All the elements are there for a prison break drama that beggars belief.
Conman Bester, who was convicted of numerous crimes and sentenced to life behind bars in 2011, reportedly burnt to death in his prison cell in May 2022. But this was questioned when reports of Thabo Bester sightings began cropping up. After nine comfortable months of freedom, authorities finally acknowledged that Bester had in fact escaped, and launched a manhunt.
Bester and his lover, it seems, were living comfortably when they were forced to go on the run. Global security company G4S was summoned to appear before parliament’s justice and correctional services committee to account for the escape. And fugitive tales raged for weeks.
Now our police minister is trumpeting the successful arrest while dodging questions on when Bester will be brought back to South Africa to face the music. Denials and arrogance continue as disbelieving followers of the story guffaw and shake their heads.
On Monday, yet another Thabo Bester statement was sent out by the SAPS head office announcing two Easter weekend arrests in connection with the case. It came with another appeal: “[National commissioner] Gen Fannie Masemola has again appealed to the media and public to exercise patience and allow the investigators the space to conduct the investigations with no undue pressure and expectation.”
Masemola, the media and public have exercised endless of patience already — how much more do you need? Nine months of investigation time were wasted before you even discovered the escape. And for you to describe pressure as “undue” is laughable because that pressure is overdue.
It’s time for action, answers and incompetent heads to roll. It’s time for this comedy to be treated like the embarrassing tragedy it is. Not just for the women who have suffered at Bester’s hands but for law-abiding South Africans who deserve a competent, accountable police service and properly secured jails.
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