Gauteng businessman and tenderpreneur Vusimuzi “Cat” Matlala will spend the weekend in jail after he made a brief appearance at the Alexandra magistrate’s court on Thursday.
Matlala (49) appeared in court on charges of attempted murder and conspiracy to commit murder following his arrest on Wednesday night.
The businessman is charged in connection with an alleged hit on television actress and influencer Tebogo Thobejane.
During court proceedings on Thursday, Matlala was added as the third accused in the murder case.
Alleged hitmen not in court
His co-accused, Musa Kekana (35) and Tiego Floyd Mabusela (47), also face charges of attempted murder and conspiracy to commit murder.
However, Kekana and Mabusela did not appear in court alongside Matlala.
In court, state prosecutor L Maphiri told magistrate Renier Boshoff that the state was opposing Matlala’s release from police custody.
Boshoff postponed the matter to Monday for bail considerations and for Matlala’s formal bail application.
Matlala was remanded in custody and is believed that his new home until his next court appearance will be the Kgosi Mampuru Prison in Pretoria.
In April, Sunday World exclusively reported that Matlala, who is suspected of being the mastermind behind the gruesome murder of whistleblower Babita Deokaran, was being criminally investigated for organising a hit on Thobejane.
At the time, Sunday World could not name Matlala, as he was reportedly under criminal investigation for tender corruption at the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (Prasa).
Well-placed sources close to Thobejane’s investigation alleged that crime intelligence unit members who were investigating Matlala’s alleged involvement in looting Prasa obtained a search and seizure warrant against him.
The police then descended on his houses in Pretoria and Johannesburg and combed them for possible incriminating evidence.
The police found and confiscated Matlala’s cellphone, said the source.
They downloaded the contents of the phone and stumbled upon WhatsApp messages between the businessman and hitmen (Kekana and Mabusela).
N1 highway ambush
It is alleged that in one of the messages, Matlala told the assassins to “shoot her in the face so that her family does not recognise her”.
Thobejane and her friend were attacked on the N1 highway near Sandton in October 2023 when unknown people sprayed the car they were travelling in with bullets.
Thobejane, who acted in the Tshivenda soap opera Muvhango, was shot in the foot while her friend sustained a gunshop wound to the spinal cord.
Thobejane has since recuperated, but her friend is still languishing in hospital, facing the prospect of never being able to walk again.
It is not known why Matlala allegedly wanted Thobejane dead, but Sunday World understands that they had known each other for a while.
