Murderer Thabo Bester was making “huge” amounts of money and was deemed “powerful” while serving life at Mangaung Correctional Centre in the Free State.
This was revealed by former justice Edwin Cameron, an inspecting judge of correctional services in parliament on Thursday.
ANC MP Anthea Ramolobeng said inmates had previously mentioned that Bester, dubbed the Facebook serial rapist, was dealing and selling drugs during his incarceration.
“It was alleged by one of the inmates that Bester was equally dealing inside the centre selling stuff. I read an article that he had a lot of money on top of his bed while he was having his laptop.
“Do you perhaps think what officials were smuggling inside the prison had a link or where dealing together in that sense,” Ramolobeng questioned.
Cameron said during a meeting with the SAPS, two officials working for G4S in charge of running the prison revealed that Bester was a powerful figure at the private prison before his May 3 escape.
“We know from our meeting with G4S personnel on the same day we met the SAPS that the last question I asked them was whether Bester was a powerful figure in the prison and they both said instantly, ‘yes’.
“The one official afterwards indicated Bester had made enormous amounts of money while inside.
“That’s why the question about the video appearance at the Sandton Convention Center in 2018 was so significant.
“He was continuing…He was carrying on his fraudulent activities from the centre and making, as you have said, huge amounts of money. That certainly was what was signalled to us by the two G4S officials we quizzed during February this year,” Cameron said.
SAPS came under fire on Thursday for failing to inform the public and Bester's victims that he had escaped from prison.
It also emerged that Bester did not have an ID when justice and correctional services portfolio chairperson Gratitude Magwanishe asked if Bester was a South African citizen or a foreign national.
He further asked how SAPS was able to verify that he's indeed a South African if he didn't have an ID.
National police commissioner Gen Fanie Masemola said: “The person who served at Mangaung is the same person who was arrested in Tanzania. There are two other Thabo Besters with IDs and this one doesn’t.”
Asked how SAPS was able to confirm that it was indeed Bester who was arrested by Tanzanian officials during the early hours of Saturday morning, Masemola revealed that he was positively identified through his fingerprints sent over to South African authorities.
– Sowetan
