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Public Interest SA calls for the: ·      Immediate reinstatement of the political killings task team ·      Rigorous enforcement of the Financial Intelligence Centre Act (FICA) to nail corrupt lawyers ·      Establishment of a comprehensive whistleblower and independent witness protection programme ·      Full transparency and accountability from the ANC.

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Sizwe sama Yende

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Political assassinations are not isolated events, but  are tied to a culture of impunity, enabled by compromised law enforcement, self-serving politicians, and a compromised criminal justice system.

Reacting to the sentencing of former ANC Youth league secretary Sandiso Magaqa’s assassin, Sibusiso Ncengwa, for 25 years on Monday, Public Interest SA said that Ncengwa’s chilling confession laid bare the ANC’s deeply entrenched culture of political patronage, rot, and deadly ambition.

“The fact that Magaqa’s murder was tied to the ruthless contestation for government positions — a hallmark of ANC factionalism — is both tragic and damning. It lays to rest any pretence that the ruling party is capable of self-correction when its members resort to mafia-style executions to secure public office and loot public coffers,” the organisation said in a statement.

Magaqa was fatally shot in 2017 when he was speaking out against a corruption-riddled tender to construct a local memorial hall at Umzimkhulu in KwaZulu-Natal. He was in the company of two councillors who survived the shooting. Umzimkhulu mayor, Mluleki Ndobe , who was widely believed to have masterminded Magaqa’s assassination, has since died.

The sentencing follows KZN police commissioner General Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi’s outcry about the disbandment of the police’s political killings task team.

Public Interest SA said that the public must not be lulled into thinking this sentencing was justice in full.

 “It is justice abridged. The fact that Magaqa’s murder was tied to the ruthless contestation for government positions — a hallmark of ANC factionalism — is both tragic and damning. It lays to rest any pretence that the ruling party is capable of self-correction when its members resort to mafia-style executions to secure public office and loot public coffers.”

The organisation said that it was disturbing that Ncengwa's confession implicated members of the legal profession who accepted large sums of illicitly obtained cash to mount his defence. “That lawyers willingly accepted money from unemployed individuals, likely knowing — or choosing not to know —that such fees were funded through blood money, raises grave questions about the ethical and regulatory oversight of legal practice in South Africa. These revelations are a chilling reminder of how systemic corruption corrodes not just political parties, but the broader criminal justice system.”

Public Interest SA said that this week’s developments were particularly poignant as they follow two equally alarming events – Mkhwanazi’s revelations and the funeral of a senior auditor from the City of Ekurhuleni, Mpho Molefe, who assassinated to stop investigations involving gigantic amounts of money.

Public Interest SA chairperson, Tebogo Khaas, said: “South Africa cannot afford to normalise the killings of whistleblowers, political actors, and public servants. The moral decay revealed by Ncengwa’s confession is a mirror to a state at war with its own future.”

Khaas said that Public Interest SA was calling for the immediate reinstatement of the political killings task team;  rigorous enforcement of the Financial Intelligence Centre Act (FICA) to nail corrupt lawyers; establishment of a comprehensive whistleblower and witness protection programme and full transparents and accountability from the ANC.