South Africa’s top anti-corruption official fears for her life after learning from an informant that hit men are being contracted to kill her, her spokeswoman said on Sunday.
Public Protector Thuli Madonsela is a leading public figure who scored a major victory when South Africa’s top court ruled on March 31 that South African President Jacob Zuma had violated the constitution by ignoring her instructions to pay back some of the US$16 million of state money spent upgrading his private home.
“On the first of April she received a text message from an informant, and that informant warned her to be careful. That person said a top gangster in the Western Cape was paid to get a hit man to kill her,” spokeswoman Kgalalelo Masibi said, confirming a report in South Africa’s Sunday Times newspaper.
Western Cape Province has a reputation for organized crime but Masibi said Madonsela did not know who wanted to kill her.
Her office, which has a constitutional mandate, probes misconduct and abuse in state affairs and can have several investigations on the go at any time.
“Security Services say that 95 percent of the time the informant is incorrect, but what if this falls under the 5 percent that is correct?” Masibi said.
She said Madonsela had been told by the informant that the hit “should be made to look natural.”
Madonsela was quoted in the Sunday Times as saying that she had stopped jogging and had become “cautious” about her movements.
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