Cape Town - Twenty-Three! That’s the number of G4S officials who were on duty and “looked the other way” as Facebook rapist and murderer Thabo Bester pulled a Houdini in the wee hours of May 3, 2022, beating a camera system that still relies on VHS tapes.
Directors for G4S, the security company which manages the Mangaung Correctional Centre, were grilled and their version of events scrutinised on day one of a two-day sitting by the justice and correctional services committee in Parliament, which zeroed in on the daring prison break, the company’s contract with Justice and Correctional Services, the contract “breach”, and questionable camera angles, among other issues.
MPs described G4S’s presentation as a “pure lie”, a “whitewash” and taking the country “for a ride” as the lawmakers focused on the company’s responses and actions in the aftermath of Bester’s prison escape.
G4S bosses presented reports on the incident where a fire had broken out in what has since been uncovered to be a staged suicide that served as a decoy for Bester’s escape.
After being on the run for a year, Bester was arrested in Tanzania last week along with his supposed customary law wife and alleged accessory, Dr Nandipha Magudumana.
Previously, G4S reportedly denied Bester had escaped, insisting he was the dead man found in his cell. However, a presentation by G4S director Cobus Groenewoud, MCC director Joseph Monyante and G4S audit and risk director Gert Beyleveld told MPs a different story on Wednesday.
The G4S officials said the control room reported the fire at 2.30am, while CCTV footage logged it at 2.59am and the troubled company’s official report stated that the fire broke out at 4am.
On a recent site visit to the MCC, MPs were told that Bester, citing safety concerns, had pushed for a transfer to a single cell. His request was approved by G4S, and not Correctional Services’ controller, and that Bester moved into the cell on April 30, 2022.
MPs took exception to the fact that Bester’s room was the only one situated on a CCTV camera’s blind spot, charging that the camera system was tampered with hours before the escape.
ANC MP Anthea Ramolobeng led the early part of the gruelling session, poking holes in the presentations by G4S officials who, at times, appeared ill-prepared or held back from committing themselves in answering some of the questions.
“The things (you’re saying) contradict one another. The times (around the escape) don’t speak to each other. For me, it’s a pure lie,” Ramolobeng put it to G4S representatives.
“The report, for me, is a whitewash.”
She asked the G4S director whether Bester’s prison break was a breach, to which he gave no definite response and at one point said he’d have to “look” at the contract. He stressed that in 22 years of operations, G4S had three escape incidents.
Interjecting, Ramolobeng said: “This is a breach. How you put, in jargon, it’s still a breach of contract between G4S and DCS (Department of Correctional Services).”
She pressed Beyleveld on the different times given for the fire.
He said he was “sorry” for the discrepancy. Beyleveld said he couldn’t conclude that one of two people, caught by a distant camera, was not Bester.
G4S officials took great pains to explain to ANC MP Qubudile Dyantyi, who questioned them as to why Bester would have had a laptop for study purposes in 2022 when his course ended in 2021.
DA MP Glynnis Breytenbach asked whether the 23 G4S officials looked away. Beyleveld said the responsible officials were dealt with.
Breytenbach was troubled by the company’s decision to move Bester to cell 35, which is a blind spot for cameras, and right next to the fire escape. Groenewoud said this was a coincidence.
Pushed on how matches and petrol used to spark the blaze made it into Bester’s cell, he said he didn’t know.
ACDP MP Steven Swart was puzzled that the company responsible for the CCTV systems, Integritron Integrated Solutions, still uses VHS tapes.
“We’re living in 2022 and we’re still dealing with cassette recorders and VHS tapes. It’s beyond comprehension. Can you explain as a company how you make use of VHS tapes that a re-recorded and used multiple times in this day and age of modern storage of information?” Swart asked the company.
From April 14 until late in April 2022, the company’s recorder was out of action, Swart said, adding that Integritron neglected to maintain the system.
He said Integritron committed “egregious negligence” in the escape by failing to see to it that the recording system worked, to which Integritron director Letichia Pedro said: “No comment.”
Led by retired judge Edwin Cameron, the Judicial Inspectorate for Correctional Services, which investigated the scandal, delivers its report today.
Independent Media investigative reporter Mzilikazi wa Afrika tweeted last night that a joint operation late yesterday by the Gauteng Organised Crime Unit and DCS had arrested a G4S employee who had allegedly adulterated the cameras for a fee.
BREAKING NEWS: A joint operation by Gauteng Organised Crime Unit and Department of Correctional Services have arrested a G4S employee who allegedly manipulated Mangaung maximum security prison cameras, for a fee, on the night and morning#ThaboBester escaped. #ThaboBesterArrested pic.twitter.com/GW4AA6eDaP
— Mzilikazi wa Afrika (@IamMzilikazi) April 12, 2023