A task team will be set up to investigate the management at Pretoria’s C-Max prison, Correctional Services Minister Ngconde Balfour said on Monday.
Balfour spoke to the South African Broadcasting Corporation after a Mozambican national, Annanias Mathe (29), escaped from the country’s most secure prison on Saturday night.
”One of the things I want done is to do a spot check on everybody who was there or who was not supposed to be there or who was not there, probably purposefully,” Balfour said.
”We need to do all those things, I need a task team with the police. We are going to do even polygraphy tests so we can get the truth of the whole thing, so we can get to the bottom of it.”
Meanwhile, the Pretoria police said a search around the clock would continue on Monday.
”We haven’t slept at all for nearly two days and are still searching for him,” said investigating officer Captain Arnold Boonstra.
It is believed that the ”Houdini” stripped and covered his entire body with petroleum jelly to climb out of a window measuring just 20cm by 60cm.
Boonstra said Mathe appeared to have uncuffed himself, climbed through several small windows after breaking them, and forced himself out onto the roof of the prison.
Correctional Services spokesperson Bheki Manzini was quoted by the Pretoria News website as saying that the escape was carried out with military precision.
Mathe apparently broke two steel bars from his bed which he wedged on either side of the opening to help him slide his shoulders through the window.
He apparently broke off another steel pipe from his bed and made a hook. He then tied his clothes and bed linen to it and used that to slide out of the cell and down the firewall.
Halfway down, Mathe used some of the grime he had collected on his way down the wall to smear a message on the prison wall saying: ”Fuck you.”
Boonstra could not confirm reports that Mathe may have colluded with prison officials during his escape.
”I can’t divulge anything at this stage. Police are busy with investigations,” he said.
However, the South African Prisoners Organisation for Human Rights (SAPOHR) said the escape was ”an inside job”.
”Although we don’t have the finer details and facts about how the escape occurred, we can without any fear of contradiction, put our heads on the block and say it was an inside job,” said SAPOHR president Golden Miles Bhudu.
This was not Mathe’s first escape from custody.
Manzini said: ”In April 2005 he escaped while in police custody. At the time he was housed next to the staff office to monitor him closely.”
It initially took a task team nine months to arrest Mathe. Boonstra, who formed part of this team, described the man as ”a scrawny little guy”.
”It took my colleague and I — we’re both over six feet and weigh more than 140kg — nearly 15 minutes to apprehend and subdue him. He has extensive military training, which we believe enabled him to escape in the manner he did,” said Boonstra.
Mathe faced 51 charges, including murder, attempted murder, rape, hijacking and armed robbery.
Mathe was detained at A6 section, which houses hardened criminals regarded as escape risks.
Boonstra urged anyone with useful information to call Captain Fires Jansen van Vuuren on 082-822-8174 or Inspector Selepe on 082-225-2230.
”Members of the public should contact police and not try to arrest him on their own because he is dangerous,” said Boonstra.
Cutting tool
Meanwhile, 15 awaiting trial prisoners escaped from the Komatipoort Prison on Saturday.
”When police came to the cells the next day, they found only five of 20 prisoners inside,” Superintendent Mtsholi Bhembe said on Monday.
The men used a cutting tool to cut through the bars of the cell window.
It is unknown how they managed to obtain a tool strong enough to cut through the bars.
”It is difficult to say how they got their hands on it. People visiting sometimes smuggle things in but we don’t know for sure how they got the tool,” said Bhembe.
”They were facing a number of charges including armed robbery, murder, dealing in dagga, housebreaking and theft of firewood,” he said.
The men are still at large but police were ”positive” they will be found.
”We appeal to the community to come forward if they have any information on any of the men but we are positive that they will be arrested.” – Sapa