Witness E testifies at the Madlanga Commission, implicating Crime Intelligence members in the murder of ANC politician Sindiso Magaqa and exposing potential political corruption. An undercover Crime Intelligence officer on Monday told the Madlanga Commission that Crime Intelligence members were involved in the 2017 murder of former ANC Youth League secretary-general Sindiso Magaqa. The officer — referred to only as Witness E for his own safety — said that two weeks before the murder, he received a phone call from one of the hitmen, who was an informant, outlining plans to “take out” Magaqa.
Witness E said he alerted his superiors in Crime Intelligence, but the information was not acted on. He claimed that some of his senior officers were involved in executing the plot to murder Magaqa. “Had my seniors reacted to the information I shared, the killing of Magaqa could have been averted,” he told the Madlanga Commission, which resumed on Monday after a seven-week break.
Magaqa, a former ANC Youth League secretary-general, wasshotin KZN’s uMzimkhulu Municipality, where he was a councillor, in July 2017. He died in September 2017. In July 2025, Sibusiso Ncengwa was sentenced to an effective 25 years’ imprisonment by the KZN Division of the High Court in Pietermaritzburg for Magaqa’s murder.
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He named his co-conspirators and the alleged mastermind, former municipal manager Stanley Sikhosana, who faces charges relating to the murder. On Monday, Witness E also told the commission that the then police minister, Senzo Mchunu, phoned him in December 2024 to request information about Magaqa’s murder. “I informed him about what happened, and particularly the police minister asked me, ‘Who are the SAPS officials who were involved in the planning and killing?’ “I told him who those officials were, and what their alleged role was in the killing of Magaqa.
I did give him all the names of all those officials,” he claimed. Witness E said Mchunu asked him whether Crime Intelligence boss Dumisani Khumalo was involved in Magaqa’s murder.
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