CAPE TOWN - KwaZulu-Natal Police Commissioner Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi has clarified and withdrawn a claim that Vusimuzi 'Cat' Matlala paid money into former police minister Bheki Cele’s bank account.
Mkhwanazi announced while testifying before the SAPS Ad Hoc committee in Parliament.
He explained that initial messages allegedly linking Matlala to Cele were mistakenly attributed.
“The analyst submitted a statement explaining how this error occurred. We were upfront in withdrawing the statements and provided a supplementary explanatory statement,” Mkhwanazi said.
Mkhwanazi suggested that Matlala may have sent messages intended for Cele to the wrong recipient.
“The owner of the number that received the messages resides in Mpumalanga and confirmed he received WhatsApp messages with bank records that he did not understand,” Mkhwanazi said.
“We believe Matlala made the same error as our team, given that the numbers differ by only one digit.”
Mkhwanazi emphasized that the mistake was unintentional.
“It was not our intention to mislead this Committee. The information was collected collectively from our team and was later discovered to be erroneous,” he said.
Meanwhile, Mkhwanazi said Members of Parliament should not get involved in police work.
He has accused some MPs of recklessly handling sensitive crime intelligence information.
DStv Channel 403
Wednesday, 18 March 2026
