theft
Mail & Guardian reporters
The former Umkhonto weSizwe cadre heading the company that controls controversial Aids drug Virodene cut his business teeth in the Southern African criminal underworld.
Former colleagues from the African National Congress’s years in exile claim Joshua Nxumalo had a reputation for “getting things done”, and that he specialised in providing stolen cars for operatives while he was based in Swaziland.
His activities also brought him into contact with individuals involved in drug trafficking, specifically in the supply of mandrax. He is alleged to have carried a proposal to the ANC from drug smugglers that the movement help them transport drugs into South Africa in return for financial help to buy arms.
Nxumalo vehemently denies this. But two senior members of the ANC in exile, speaking on condition of anonymity, told the Mail & Guardian this week they were party to the decision to reject the drug smugglers’ offer.
Repeated clashes with the ANC leadership in exile over his activities eventually led to Nxumalo leaving the ANC in the mid-1980s. In one incident in the 1980s, his former comrades say, the movement’s security officials shot Nxumalo in the leg in Lusaka, the location of the party’s headquarters, after he was taken in to be disciplined.
Outside the ANC, Nxumalo built up extensive business contacts across Southern, East and West Africa before he returned to South Africa in 1992.
He caught the attention of the former South African Police shortly after his return, and remains a figure of intense police interest. It is understood, however, that there is no investigation currently under way.
Nxumalo emerged late last year as a minority shareholder in the company developing Virodene. He received the stake in return for “introductions” work – which, according to fellow shareholders, included arranging meetings with senior government officials. Nxumalo has denied any close ties to government officials.
A consortium of Southern African businessmen formed and led by Nxumalo recently took control of Virodene, in a deal worth at least R20-million. He describes himself as a businessman, with his chief business a construction company he built up in Soweto.
But the picture painted by his former comrades and colleagues suggests Nxumalo is one of the more colourful and well-connected characters of the liberation movement.
Described as a gifted and daring wheeler-dealer whom the ANC found too hot to handle, Nxumalo admits he has been jailed in two countries, Tanzania and Swaziland. He even survived a botched abduction and assassination attempt led by former Vlakplaas commander Dirk Coetzee in 1981.
Also known as “General”, the 45-year-old Nxumalo was a senior figure in ANC operational structures in Swaziland in the late 1970s and the early 1980s, dealing with the Transvaal. His direct line of command included John Nkadimeng, now South Africa’s representative in Cuba.
Former colleagues say he became a legendary figure among ANC members in Swaziland, escorting operatives to and from the South African border and smuggling stolen cars out of South Africa. Nxumalo says he was in charge of intelligence in Swaziland. He was jailed for a total of three years – made up of a string of shorter sentences – but maintains that he was merely taking the wrap for undisclosed offences committed by his underlings.
Nxumalo’s encounter with Vlakplaas surfaced last year in the submission to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission by Coetzee and his sidekick, Almond Nofomela.
The two had attempted to drug Nxumalo by spiking his drink in order to spirit him across the border – probably to his death. “He was the main money-man in Swaziland, supplying money for all the missions of the cadres coming through from Mozambique on their way to South Africa on missions,” Coetzee told the commission. The plan failed when Nxumalo threw the drink away.
“His drink was supposed to have been spiked in order to aggravate his intoxication, and we found things didn’t work out that way,” Nofomela told the truth commission. “This person was very strong and he resisted, to such an extent that Captain Dirk Coetzee said we should leave.” Nxumalo bit Nofomela so hard he still carries the scar.
Nxumalo’s activities after 1981 remain unclear. He says he stayed in Swaziland until 1984, when he went to Dar es Salaam, still as a member of Umkhonto weSizwe. He was also jailed there, but Nxumalo says this was for fighting. “I was very stubborn and very difficult,” he adds. “I used to fight a lot.”
Other sources, however, believe Nxumalo was already operating for personal gain by the mid-1980s, travelling around Zimbabwe, Tanzania, Mozambique and Swaziland.
Frustrated by the ANC’s caution, Nxumalo was isolated following the order from then party president Oliver Tambo in the early 1980s that ANC members should cease any involvement with stolen cars.
The ANC’s refusal to countenance any dealings with drug smugglers would also have been a major blow. Key trafficking points for mandrax from India into Southern Africa were all areas in which the ANC was well established – Swaziland, Mozambique, Tanzania and Zambia.
The Southern African trade in stolen cars and parts has also long been entwined with mandrax trafficking in the area. The mandrax trade burgeoned in the 1980s, with the drug becoming one of the most prevalent in South Africa.
Nxumalo, however, strongly denies any involvement in drugs. “If I had been, I would have been a millionaire by now,” he says.