The Suspect

Script

25’

02’45

Russel Bhekani Ngubo is a top civil servant.

He’s a deputy director in the Department of Correctional Services.

He is also an ANC councillor.

And yet, he has more than once been charged with murder.

Many say he’s a warlord.

He’s accused of intimidation and vice.

But each time he walks free.

He says he’s innocent – the victim of a terrible conspiracy.

03’30

Russel Ngubo' story starts about an hour's drive away from his workplace… at Impendle, his home in the Kwazulu-natal midlands.

Over the last decade there's been much blood split here.

The political violence between ANC and IFP and UDM split the community.

Leading to hostility and tension.

Many people died.

03’56

Russel Ngubo has survived the battles.

He’s now one of the strong men of the midlands.

His nickname here is Gxovu, the man who gets things done.

 

He’s run prisons for the government. He’s respected by the ANC.

And he has a reputation for standing his ground in times of trouble.

Politics made him powerful; it’s also got him into trouble.

04’42

RUSSEL BHEKANI NGUBO:

Before the 1994 elections that is where everything started (...) after that incident that took place in 1994 when I was ambushed by alleged IFP members everything became clear to everyone who is a resident of Impendle.

05’09

Ngubo took us to a field at Gomane. He says he was attacked here by gun-toting IFP members just before the 1994 elections. The attack was a turning point in his life. Until then, he’d been operating underground for the ANC.

05’24

RUSSEL BHEKANI NGUBO:

It was clear that the main target was Russel Ngubo () They knew that I was an ANC member before that incident, a week before that incident I had a meeting in Stoffelton to try and recruit people to join the ANC.

05’40

Ngubo speaks often about this attack. It was here that he lost his fear.

05’46

RUSSEL BHEKANI NGUBO:

I think that incident on its own change - m mind and it made me - I became so strong and very much brave. The fear that I had before was taken away and I became - everybody knew from that day that Ngubo was an ANC man and I became so much strong in trying to mobilise people to join the ANC.

06’15

At the time, Impendle was IFP turf.

But Ngubo successfully turned his home into an ANC stronghold.

He started by recruirting his family - his aging father and mother, his brothers and sisters and their families.

He went on to sign up 10 000 people for the ANC.

But it was dangerous work.

Since then he’s been a target.

But he always gets away.

06’44

M:So these are your scars, show me where the bullet went?

R: Uuuh, I was shot here, the bullet went here and came out that side, ja it was one bullet but they used a very big rifle, it was an R5.

How often have you been attacked?

R: Six times.

ME: Six serious attempts on your life?

Russel: Ja

07’05

But Ngubo is living a dangerous life in another sense.

The police have linked him to numerous murders. He’s been charged, arrested… but always acquitted.

The cases against him have collapsed for lack of evidence.

Key witnesses have disappeared.

But confidential intelligence documents also finger him as a mastermind behind hitsquad activities… many of them in Impendle, over the last decade.

The worst of the allegations is that he used Correctional Services warders, weapons and transport for assassinations.

07’39

RUSSEL BHEKANI NGUBO:

About the harassment about the police, its not something new, something that happened long ago, and the way I am looking at it is that the very same policemen maybe are being used by other political parties to achieve their goals, I dunno.

08’02

The IFP and UDM single out Ngubo as the problem. The IFP believes he enjoys political protection.

08’09

VELAPHI NDLOVU, IFP HEAD OF SECURITY, MP

You know we always blame him for the killings that took place from Elandskop, from the murder that happened at Henley dam up to the last murder that happened at Nzimande's house. In other words, The IFP believes that Ngubo is behind the killings, or the technically he has not been found guilty of all the atrocities that we are talking about.

08’36

THANDA VAN WYK, UDM

FORMERLY ANC

People are afraid, you hear the rumours around, people are afraid to say what is happening but in the corners you hear them say they have got the feeling that Bhekani is the one that involved in the killings of the people in Impendle.

08’54

Ngubo believes the IFP and the UDM are resentful because he turned Impendle to the ANC.

He’s now an undisputed leader here.

Although he’s only 36, the community bring their problems to him.

But Ngubo did not become a leader on his own.

At first, he worked with one of the Midlands most notorious warlords, Sifiso Nkabinde. This was before Nkabinde's was expelled by the ANC, before he joined the UDM.

Nkabinde's followers remember Ngubo's skills on the frontline.

09’35

SFISO BENGU

SFISO NKABINDE'S PERSONAL ASSISTANT

Nugbo was the man who was a local person there, so eventually we moved in you know, using his recruitment skills, I don't know what skills he was using, but we did move in and we launched a lot ofbrnaches there through him.

09’52

THANDA VAN WYK, UDM

NKABINDE SUPPORTER

People are like afraid of him, when he comes up and he says something, they will just run to what he has said, and they will do what they have told him to do, so it was easier for him just to call up the meetings and then we would come up and launch the branches and come back with the membership to the ANC.

10’17

SFISO BENGU

SFISO NKABINDE'S PERSONAL ASSISTANT

He was that kind of a man who could go into an area whenever he wanted to go in, and we went in.

At that time, Ngubo had already suffered a double tragedy… his family was attacked.

10’29

RUSSEL BHEKANI NGUBO:

I lost my son, my beloved son, Lindelani, he was having six years when he was killed -(SHOW PICTURE OF LINDELANI) I lost also my beloved brother, younger brother, Aron, my wife Pumile she is alive but here left arm is paralysed, and I have my young son Andile, he is also paralysed, he was shot through the spine so he is using crutches whenever he is walking.

11’13

ANDILE NGUBO

We were going to school and a silver BM came up and a man came out and then he took the gun and then he shot us, and then my father laid down the seats and then the police came up and then he shot the BM tyre and then they carry on going and then some of the people who worked with my father came and helped us.

11’49

The Kwazulu-Natal midlands have long been the site of bloody political battles. Assassinations are commonplace; thousands have died as political parties and warlords jostle for power.

12’02

VELAPHI NDLOVU, IFP HEAD OF SECURITY

We are talking about people who think like that in this province, who don't think of wooing people in their fold to make sure that they are proper members of the party, but who believe that intimidation will play a big part and if you kill the shepherd you get the flocks.

12’25

Even today there are ghostly reminders of the war in Impendle.

Atrocities were committed on all sides;

Families have fled, brother has lost sister, mother has lost son.

Here are the remains of abandoned lives, here is a heritage of fear.

And one of the people in Impendle most feared, is Russel Ngubo.

ME: Do you get a feeling that most people are frightened of you?

12’58

RUSSEL BHEKANI NGUBO:

You are more than right that most of the people are frightened of me. And that is my problem also marion, why, I don't know I am very much friendly but at the same time, I am a straightforward somebody.

13’16

Ngubo and his supporters believe the media are to blame for his bad image.

Russel reserves particular contempt for Paul Kirk, now a journalist for the Mail and Guardian.

13’30

RUSSEL BHEKANI NGUBO:

Some of the journalists are not honest, they are not doing their job as they are expected to do in terms of publicizing what is good for the public, others they have their own agenda in order to achieve some political agenda of some political parties.

Kirk denies being part of a political conspiracy. He says Ngubo is newsworthy.

14’02

PAUL KIRK, JOURNALIST:

Russel Ngubo is a high government official, he's a public servant which certainly puts him in a different league to the man in the street. The crimes that he is accused of and is being investigated for are not petty crimes, they amount to wholesale genocide. In one instance, he is alleged to have led a hitsquad to attack an IFP celebration near his homestead, they went to the wrong kraal, they murdered everybody there, they went back, realised they had hit the wrong kraal, and went back the next day to the job properly. This is certainly not your average petty crime. We are not talking of someone with parking tickets.

14’57

Ngubo is lives and works at Pietermaritzburg Prison.

From a prison warder, he’s risen to deputy director. Two years ago he was Head of this Prison. Now he has an office job.

We went there to talk to Ngubo's colleagues about the man the media dubbed the Prison Boss from Hell.

15’20

PHILEMON NTULI, SPOKESPERSON KWAZULU-NATAL CORRECTIONAL SERVICES

You talk about the leader, you talk about the person who wants things to be done according to his own plan as his area manager has said, and then you are speaking about a person who wants to control in any aspects of the situation, so that is why we are utilising him even in Newcastle when there was a problem in Newcastle, we utilised him also in Pietermaritzburg prison.

ME: So what you are saying is that you can use him in trouble spots?

NTULI: He can restore order where there is no order, he is a person of that kind, one may perceive him as a person who is sometimes agressive and but his approach at such times does makes things right.

15’58

But Ngubo has a reputation in some parts of the prison services for causing trouble.

He was a founder member of POPCRU in the province. It’s alleged he used violence and intimidation to meet the union's goals. Ngubo denies these allegations. But over the years the Department of Correctional Service has served no fewer than ten interdicts on him for violent behaviour. The most recent was last year… when he allegedly threatened the then provincial commissioner, Thandiwe Kgosidintsi…. Soon after she’d taken up her position.

Kgosidints claims she was threatened by Ngubo and a gang of POPCRU members. They wanted her to resign. Humiliated, she eventually quit.

16’30

(THANDI's affadavit to be read by MPHO)

"I was pushed off my chair and made to kneel on the floor.

They were abusive, unruly and insulting.

They called me a liar and a bitch and I was even spat upon.

Those present bore arms which they brandished about.

The gathering was so unruly I feared for my life."

16’47

POPCRU has remained a strong and at times militant force in Kwazulu-Natal. Ngubo is associated with that militancy. But Popcru denies he used violence to get his way.

16’57

CHRIS NXUMALO, POPCRU

In law, if those people can't prove it who are well qualified in interpreting law and investigating, it suggests to me that Ngubo is not involved in all those things. Basically, he has been targeted because he is a leader, in short.

MAKHAYA, RUSSEL'S BOSS

I would call him an action man, a person who likes to have things done.

Are you frightened of him at all?

giggle uh not really but maybe I have worked with him for quite some time, I would not say I am scared of him.

17’31

Correctional Services has decided to stand by their man. Ngubo's bad name has not stopped him climbing up the ranks relatively swiftly.

But the elite Scorpions unit is still sifting through evidence… that may link Ngubo to many murders. They refused to talk to us… but on a tip off we went back to Impendle.

We discovered a crucial bit of evidence, lying abandoned in the grass near Ngubo's home.

This rusting combi is a tangible link between a political murder and the Pietermaritzburg Correctional Services where Ngubo is the number two in command.

It was the vehicle used two years ago in the assassination of this man (photo) Ernest Nzimande, the nduna of Impendle… and one of Ngubo's greatest enemies. He was also an ally of warlord Sifiso Nkabinde.

16’24

SFISO BENGU

SFISO NKABINDE'S PERSONAL ASSISTANT

In the Impendle area there were two leaders there who were being recognised by the people, it was Ngubo and the last Nduna Nzimande. Now as time went on there appeared to be a split between Ngubo and Nzimande because I think people respected Nduna Nzimande as a traditional leader and as a very good person, and I think people were sort of terrified of Ngubo,

18’55

THANDA VAN WYK, FORMER COLLEAGUE OF NGUBO

There were bad clashes between them because for example one there was one time where Nzimande's shops were always broken in, and he would come back and tell us that the people who broke into his shop were the boys who were Bhekani Ngubo's bodyguards. Sfiso would talk to Bhekani to try and settle that but once Sfiso would go out of Stoffelton, things back again to as they were

 

19’25

SFISO BHENGU,

Bhengu: Sifiso started to side with Nduna Nzimande and that did not go down well with Ngubo. And towards the local government elections of 1996, Sfiso wanted Nduna Nzimande to become the leader of that area, I think councilor in that area, and Ngubo wanted that position.

19’53

Tensions reached boiling point over the control of an RDP water scheme. The scheme would provide tap water to the people of Upper Makhuzeni in Impendle.

Ngubo believed he should be the leader of the project, not Nzimande.

This man headed the Indlovu Regional Council at the time. He tried to sort out the dispute at a special meeting. Ngubo had allegedly threatened the workers, and was making things difficult for all concerned.

20’30

JOHAN NGCOBO, FORMER CHAIR OF INDLOVU REGIONAL COUNCIL

Well the meeting was not a smooth meeting, it was a nasty meeting...well it was nasty in that the other people were feeling that since Councillor Nzimande had left the ANC they were the legitimate councillors to control the project, but however we realised that there was a sort of a misconception because the project had not been awarded on political basis but merely to a community.

21’22

James Rivet–Carnac is the engineer who designed the water system. He remembers how this scheme came to a dramatic halt in the Spring of 1998.

21’36

JAMES RIVETT-CARNAC, ENGINEER

As I say, there was a lot of tension on the site, and then on the 13th of September I got a telephone call, it was Sunday I remember it very well, I had taken my kids to soccer and I got a call from the site agent out there to say that he had witnessed the assassination of Ernest Nzimande on that same day. I immediately told him that he should secure the site and leave the area because I felt his life was also in danger....on the Tuesday I got report that on the Monday evening, persons unknown had attacked the site office and had burnt down the caravan and had actually murdered the night watchman who happened to be sleeping inside the caravan at the time.

22’25

Eye-witnesses told the police what happened at the murder scene. The police wouldn’t talk to us. It was too sensitive they said.

When news got around of the Special Assignmentinvestigation into Russel Ngubo, a tape was sent to us. It’s a recording of a senior Kwaulu-Natal investigator… talking to someone else about the murder. We know who this investigator is.

22’50

They had three people lying next to the road ,you see, and they waited for him come out of the road from his house and they laid ambush for him. And he was only wounded, him and his bodyguards, they got out of their vehicle now, and this kombi was coming, and somebody was driving it, and he tried to stop the kombi to ask for help. And then the men who driving the kombi, pulled out his gun and shot him

And they split his whole head open.

ME asks question of Ncgobo:

When you heard that Nzimande had been shot, did it come as a shock to you?

Ncgobo:

It did not come as at a shock and a surprise to me because he indicated that he had continually been receiving threatening and abusive calls from unknown people. ****

22’39

The 3 million rand RDP water scheme was then cancelled.

It was virtually complete.

These reservoirs have been standing empty and abandoned for more than two years.

They’re located just above the Ngubo homestead. It was a waste of time and money.

Only now, are attempts being made to revive the scheme.

23’58

JAMES RIVETT-CARNAC

Development is a game fraught with these kinds of problems, but you accept it as part of the job. But to actually find threats being levelled against the chairman of the committee and then those threats being followed up by actual assassination, and the police unable to resolve things, the workers being intimidated, the PSC being intimidated to meet anymore so that the projects has to be abandoned, no we have never come across anything like that before.

24’30

Nobody has yet been charged with the murder of Nzimande.

But what makes it all so curious is the evidence left behind.

As they sped away, the assassins took the corner too fast and crashed.

(recreation with the combi over the Umkomaas River)

They then poured petrol over the car, set it alight and fled.

(photos of the combi in its burnt state)

But the police established some startling facts. The kombi had been hired by Correctional Services…. through the Durban-Westville prison. But it had been used by staff at Pietermaritzburg Prison.

On further investigation they found that one of Russel Ngubo's best and oldest friends - in fact his next-door neighbour – claimed he had driven the car the very morning of the assassination.

Charles Ndumo states in an affadivit that he was hi-jacked at five o' clock in the morning… at this corner in Pietermaritzburg. (picture of corner)

He only reported the hijacking fourteen hours later, at this police station.

By that time, the police had already traced the car through the chassis number. They contacted the hire company… who’s been trying to get compensation ever since. There are suggestions that Correctional Services' own investigations were a cover-up.

The police are also sceptical about the hi-jacking.

You see the story of the hi-jacking, I don't believe it was hi-jacked right. I know they are lying. I mean all that - we know that they are lying.

22’54

THANDA VAN WYK:

There are a lot of allegations that click that click up Ngubo with the assassination of Nzimande because the question outside is what was the Correctional Services car doing at Impendle because it was hired at the Westville prison and what did it want here in Pietermaritzburg, and at the end of the day it was found in Impendle. That is the question, and the people are asking.

26’25

ME: Did you play any role in the murder of Nduna Ernest Nzimande?

No, no.

Why do you think you have been fingered in this way?

26’35

RUSSEL BHEKANI NGUBO:

No I think maybe I have been fingered just because Nzimande was my neighbour, at the same time, Nduna Nzimande was expelled maybe from the ANC, one can conclude then that if Nzimande was killed then Ngubo was involved. Ngubo was not involved there, Ngubo was at work, and I don't see any reason why I am being fingered on that one. Yes there are some other allegations that a Kombi that was hired by the department was used to assassinate Nzimande so I can be fingered also because I am employed the Department of Correctional Services, I mean for those points I have mentioned, one can conclude that definitely Ngubo was involved which was not the case. Its not the case.

27’43

Ngubo is denies all wrong doing. But the mystery of the white kombi remains. The Scorpions are investigating it … along with other accusations against Ngubo.

National Intelligence is also asking about the kombi. They’re probing a the link between Ngubo and Hitsquads.

(Russel doing his maths)

Meanwhile, Ngubo, the Suspect, continues his career at Pietermaritzburg prison. With his eye on advancement, he’s taking a management course by correspondence through the University of Wales.

28’25

End