Wonder Hlongwa
Residents of the township of Mpuma- langa in KwaZulu-Natal are living in fear of an alleged serial killer who they believe is being protected by the authorities because he is a police informer.
Sbusiso ”Sbra” Makhaye (22), who has been implicated in nine murders in the past four years, was mysteriously released from jail after his last murder and continues to stalk potential witnesses who are willing to testify against him in court.
Mpumalanga mayor Meshack Hadebe says with dismay that the system of justice in the township has broken down completely. And township police and acquaintances of Makhaye say he has been able to avoid prosecution because key witnesses against him were killed before they could testify or others were too scared to appear in court.
Which is why Evart Gabela fears for his life. ”Maybe he wants to eliminate me too, because I’m the leading witness in my brother’s murder,” says Gabela, who saw Makhaye shoot his brother dead two years ago because his brother refused to give Makhaye a cigarette.
Makhaye was scheduled to go on trial last month for the April 1996 murder of Bongani Gabela. But he disappeared from a magistrate’s courtroom in Camperdown just before his trial began.
The magistrate issued a warrant of arrest, but Makhaye remains at large.
The prosecutor in the trial, Deline Barnard, could not explain how Makhaye disappeared.
”His attorney phoned telling us that Makhaye was in court,” she said. ”One prosecutor spoke to him, but just before the trial began he disappeared.”
However, Evart Gabela said he has seen Makhaye near his home several times recently.
A senior Mpumalanga police officer said Makhaye is a known police informer and is highly regarded by some police officers. One described Makhaye as a ”reasonable man”. The source said Makhaye has been involved in only five murders, not nine as other officials believe.
”He looks decent; you can’t believe that it’s him who has been doing all these things,” the police officer said.
However, Mpumalanga police station commissioner CF Coetzee vehemently denied that Makhaye is an informer. Coetzee said Makhaye has not been responsible for any murders.
Makhaye was out on bail on another murder charge when Hadebe apprehended him in a citizen’s arrest for the killing of Bongani Gabela more than two years ago.
The mayor handed Makhaye over to police. Hadebe said Gabela was Makhaye’s ninth victim.
”He [Makhaye] just became wild, we don’t know what happened,” said Hadebe. ”We don’t even know what happened to our judicial system. They tell you that the jails are full, and he’s been in custody for too long.”
After he was charged with murdering Gabela in April 1996, Makhaye was held in custody until December 1997, when he was released on bail and scheduled to go on trial last month.
Evart Gabela said he and a friend were watching television in his home when they heard a gunshot. He said they looked outside and saw Makhaye shooting his brother.
Gabela said he ran to rescue his brother, who was running away from Makhaye towards their house. Gabela said he pleaded with Makhaye not to kill his brother, to no avail. He asked his brother what happened, and his brother said Makhaye had shot him because he refused to give Makhaye a cigarette.
At that point, Gabela said: ”He [Makhaye] shot him [Bongani Gabela] several times, and he fell down on our house’s gate. I tried to lift him up but he was already dead.”
Makhaye’s killing spree started in 1994 when he was 18 years old, just after his mother died and before he dropped out of school, according to a schoolmate.
”When he came back from a short stint in prison, he accused some of his schoolmates of having proposed to his girlfriend while he was in jail,” said Sipho Mchunu, who went to the same school as Makhaye.
”After he had an argument with these two guys he shot and killed one of them. That was his last day at school.”
A few days later the second schoolmate was shot dead. Makhaye, who had become one of the most feared youngsters in the township, was arrested and spent about a year in custody. He was released because of lack of evidence.
”People were afraid to testify against him,” said Mchunu.
Makhaye was also arrested in connection with the murder of two youths at Woody Glen and Unit Four in Mpumalanga township. When he was arrested, he agreed that he was at the scene of the killing, but denied that he shot the two youths.
”He told the court that it was his accomplice, a Gazeni, who shot the two youths,” a senior police officer in Mpumalanga said. ”But Gazeni was shot just before the trial began. And [Makhaye] was released.”
”If that is true, why is he not convicted?” Coetzee said when asked about the murder accusations against Makhaye. ”You are fishing for a story where there is no story. Just because the mayor’s relative [Gabela] is involved – it’s a big story!”
Ironically, though Makhaye has been charged with five murders, the police don’t have a photograph of him, police said.