AN ELITE team of police investigators is one step closer to solving a 25-year-old murder case with links to the infamous Mandela United Football Club.
The investigative team, comprising the Hawks unit that deals with crimes against the state, and the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA), exhumed two bodies from a pauper’s grave in Soweto’s Avalon Cemetery.
The bodies are believed to be those of Lolo Sono and Siboniso Tshabalala.
Central to the high-profile investigation is the Mandela soccer club, which at the time was linked to Winnie Madikizela-Mandela.
It is suspected that soccer club members murdered the two youths in November 1988. Their bodies were found in a field in Diepkloof, Soweto with multiple stab wounds.
They were alleged to be apartheid police informers.
Sono and Tshabalala were killed days after a police raid on the club and team coach Jerry Richardson.
In 1997, Nicodemus Sono told the Truth and Reconciliation Commission that Madikizela-Mandela and her bodyguards, said to be Mandela United members, had brought his badly beaten son to his home in a minibus at gunpoint.
He said the vehicle appeared to be filled with other “possible” victims.
Madikizela-Mandela denied her involvement in Sono’s disappearance despite assertions he was last seen alive in her company.
Sono’s cousin, Frans Maluleka, an ANC operative and Richardson’s police handler, was killed during the raid.
In 1991, Madikizela-Mandela was convicted of kidnapping and of being an accessory to assault arising from the murder of 14-year-old ANC activist James Seipei, better known as Stompie.
Her sentence was cut to a fine and a two-year suspended sentence on appeal.
The body of Seipei, who had been accused of being a police informer, was found in the veld near Madikizela-Mandela’s home on January 6 1989. Richardson was convicted of the murder and sentenced to life in prison. He died in prison in 2009.
Though the police yesterday stopped short of implicating Madikizela-Mandela in the killings of Sono and Tshabalala, they did reveal the recent discovery of “explosive” new evidence.
Apparently the investigation is so “sensitive” that President Jacob Zuma is said to be constantly briefed on developments.
Hawks spokesman Captain Paul Ramaloko said central to the investigation was an undertaker’s report.
“Had it not been for this recent discovery, the case – through the disappearance of a missing person’s report opened by Sono’s father in 1988, which implicated certain people – could have been jeopardised.”
Asked if Madikizela-Mandela was a suspect or if she had or would be questioned, he said the team would be guided by the investigation.
Madikizela-Mandela’s personal assistant, Zodwa Zwane, said yesterday that Madikizela-Mandela was sick and asked that questions be e-mailed to her. At the time of going to press, she had not responded.
’Explosive’ evidence on Sono
The investigative team, comprising the Hawks unit that deals with crimes against the state, and the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA), exhumed two bodies from a pauper’s grave in Soweto’s Avalon Cemetery.
The bodies are believed to be those of Lolo Sono and Siboniso Tshabalala.
Central to the high-profile investigation is the Mandela soccer club, which at the time was linked to Winnie Madikizela-Mandela.
It is suspected that soccer club members murdered the two youths in November 1988. Their bodies were found in a field in Diepkloof, Soweto with multiple stab wounds.
They were alleged to be apartheid police informers.
Sono and Tshabalala were killed days after a police raid on the club and team coach Jerry Richardson.
In 1997, Nicodemus Sono told the Truth and Reconciliation Commission that Madikizela-Mandela and her bodyguards, said to be Mandela United members, had brought his badly beaten son to his home in a minibus at gunpoint.
He said the vehicle appeared to be filled with other “possible” victims.
Madikizela-Mandela denied her involvement in Sono’s disappearance despite assertions he was last seen alive in her company.
Sono’s cousin, Frans Maluleka, an ANC operative and Richardson’s police handler, was killed during the raid.
In 1991, Madikizela-Mandela was convicted of kidnapping and of being an accessory to assault arising from the murder of 14-year-old ANC activist James Seipei, better known as Stompie.
Her sentence was cut to a fine and a two-year suspended sentence on appeal.
The body of Seipei, who had been accused of being a police informer, was found in the veld near Madikizela-Mandela’s home on January 6 1989. Richardson was convicted of the murder and sentenced to life in prison. He died in prison in 2009.
Though the police yesterday stopped short of implicating Madikizela-Mandela in the killings of Sono and Tshabalala, they did reveal the recent discovery of “explosive” new evidence.
Apparently the investigation is so “sensitive” that President Jacob Zuma is said to be constantly briefed on developments.
Hawks spokesman Captain Paul Ramaloko said central to the investigation was an undertaker’s report.
“Had it not been for this recent discovery, the case – through the disappearance of a missing person’s report opened by Sono’s father in 1988, which implicated certain people – could have been jeopardised.”
Asked if Madikizela-Mandela was a suspect or if she had or would be questioned, he said the team would be guided by the investigation.
Madikizela-Mandela’s personal assistant, Zodwa Zwane, said yesterday that Madikizela-Mandela was sick and asked that questions be e-mailed to her. At the time of going to press, she had not responded.
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