The Walter Sisulu University management believe they are closer to finding the portrait of former president Thabo Mbeki which disappeared from the institution’s council chambers at the Potsdam campus in 2012.
This after a Facebook user announced on the social networking site he had stolen the portrait during a student protest.
His confession was seen by a university staffer who made a screen grab of the post and alerted management.
The person with the username Mzontsundu Speaker Ngceba made the shocking claims in the comments section of another user’s status update.
On Tuesday August 2 at 4.33pm Amathole district municipality’s chief of staff in the mayor’s office Samkelo Ngwenya posted a picture of himself hanging a portrait of Thabo Mbeki on the wall.
Commenting on the post Ngceba wrote “Cde Sam, ndinayo lo portrait exactly, I stole it eCouncil chambers WSU kune strike but wena you bought it moss” .”
The screen grab has been forwarded to the institution’s chief operations officer Gert Labuschagne.
Ngwenya later corrected Ngceba, saying he did not buy the portrait but took it from his workplace where it was gathering dust at the time Thabo Mbeki’s face was being taken down from state institutions after he was recalled as president in 2008.
A Facebook search for Ngceba claims he was an employee of the National Youth Development Agency and worked at the Department of Sport, Arts and Culture. In a telephone interview with the Dispatch Ngceba denied everything until the Dispatch told him about the screen grab.
Giggling, he later said he and a group of students he was leading in his capacity as an SRC leader destroyed Mbeki’s portrait along with portraits of the university head and minister of education.
He also said the incident took place at the institution’s Ibika campus, not in Potsdam.
WSU spokeswoman Yonela Tukwayo said the institution viewed the matter seriously. — malibongwed@dispatch.co.za