The tentacles of controversial entrepreneur and suspected underworld figure Vusimuzi “Cat” Matlala could reach as high as the Lesotho prime minister’s office.
Recently, the Mountain Kingdom opposition political party leader fanned the flames when he asked Prime Minister Sam Matekane if he has any relationship with the controversial South African. He is yet to answer the question.
Machesetsa Mofomobe, the leader of Lesotho’s Basotho National Party (BNP) and a member of the Lesotho National Assembly, asked Matekane if Matlala attended his inauguration on October 28 2022 and whether Matekane had ever visited Matlala at his Gauteng residence.
The questions dated July 31, 2025, were asked in writing in parliament after a source
disclosed the relationship to Mofomobe.
He told Sunday World this week: “After Matlala was arrested in May, a person who is part of his inner circle contacted me and told me that Matlala and the prime minister have a close relationship.
“The person said Matlala was present at the prime minister’s inauguration and that the prime minister had visited Matlala at his Gauteng residence.”
Sunday World was unable to obtain a comment from the prime minister, but his spokesperson recently told a Lesotho newspaper that the government leader would answer the questions in parliament in accordance with the nation’s laws.
Matlala’s name was thrust into the media limelight when, during a media briefing on July 6, 2025, KwaZulu-Natal police commissioner Lt-Gen Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi said Matlala was awarded an SAPS tender worth more than R360 million in 2024.
Mkhwanazi stated that national police commissioner Gen Fannie Masemola cancelled the tender on May 13, 2025.
This was a day before Matlala was arrested on suspicion that he was behind the attempted murder of famous television actress and influencer Tebogo Thobejane.
The provincial commissioner said he was in possession of WhatsApp communication between Matlala and a Mr Brown Mogotsi, a comrade of police minister Senzo Mchunu, in which they supposedly discussed how Mogotsi was working to get Mchunu and deputy national police commissioner for crime detection Lt-Gen Shadrack Sibiya to thwart the police investigations into Matlala.
He also said there was proof of payments, showing that Matlala funded ANC activities and events for Mchunu and Mogotsi.
He also stated that he believed Mchunu and Sibiya decided to disband the KwaZulu-Natal SAPS political killings task team because it had raided Matlala’s home.
Matlala (49) and alleged hitmen Musa Kekana (35), Tiego Floyd Mabusela (47), Matlala’s wife Tsakani (36) and Nthabiseng Nzama (23) face various charges, including attempted murder, conspiracy to commit murder, money laundering, and fraud in connection with the Thobejane shooting.
Thobejane and her friends, Anele Malinga and Ncube Khumbulani, were ambushed on the N1 highway near Sandton in October 2023. The car they were travelling in was sprayed with bullets.
Matlala and Thobejane are ex-lovers.
The accused will appear in the Alexandra Magistrate’s Court on August 26.
Tsakani and Nzama are out on R20 000 and R10 000 bail, respectively. Matlala, Kekana and Mabusela remain in police custody.
In April, Sunday World exclusively reported that Matlala, a suspected mastermind behind the gruesome murder of Gauteng health department corruption whistleblower Babita Deokaran, was under investigation for the apparent hit on Thobejane.
At the time, the tycoon was under investigation for tender corruption at the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa, but Sunday World could not name him.
Well-placed sources said during this investigation that police hit pay dirt when WhatsApp messages between Matlala and the two hitmen in the Thobejane matter were uncovered.
In one message, Matlala allegedly orders the assassins to “shoot her in the face so that her family does not recognise her”.
Thobejane, an actress in the Tshivenda soap opera Muvhango, was shot in the foot, and one of her friends was shot in the spine.
She is still languishing in hospital, facing the prospect of never being able to walk again.
