Police watchdog completes probe into Khayelitsha torture case

Mandla Bawuti, who says he was present when police officers tortured his friend Nonkululo Fente to death in April, addresses a crowd of supporters outside Lingelethu West police station in Khayelitsha. Fente’s sister, Nontsikelelo Fente, is second from left. Photo: Mary-Anne Gontsana

• The Independent Police Investigative Directorate (IPID) has finalised its probe into the death of Nonkululo Fente in April, but the outcome of the investigation has not been made public.
• According to a witness, she died when police officers tortured her during a raid on her tavern in Khayelitsha.
• On Wednesday, relatives, friends and supporters marched to the Lingelethu West police station to demand answers.

The Independent Police Investigating Directorate (IPID) has finalised its investigation into the death on 30 April of 38-year-old Nonkululo Fente in her tavern in Khayelitsha, Cape Town. But the outcome of the probe is not yet known.

According to a friend who says he was present at the time, Fente was beaten and suffocated with a plastic bag when police raided her tavern looking for drugs. She died on the spot.

IPID spokesperson told GroundUp: the “investigation is finalised, we are only awaiting technical reports.” He did not give further details.

On Wednesday, a few dozen family members, friends and supporters marched to the Lingelethu West police station in Khayelitsha to demand answers.

Fente’s friend, Mandla Bawuti, who was with Fente and says he was tortured with her, told GroundUp that the incident happened at 7:30pm. He said the two of them and another friend were drinking, smoking and watching TV in the shack in Town Two where Fente sold alcohol.

“She had closed the business already for the day when she noticed blue lights and about four SAPS vans outside.”

“About ten police officers stormed in, all in uniform but no name badges. They told all three of us to get up. Some officers started searching the house, the rest were searching us. They took our phones and demanded that she unlock her phone specifically. I tried to intervene but was told to keep quiet if I knew what was good for me.”

Bawuti says officers took him to a room where he was told to sit on a beer crate. A few minutes later, he says, Fente, visibly shaken, was brought into the room in handcuffs.

“They kept asking us where the drugs were and we kept telling them we did not know,” he says.

“They took turns slapping and beating us. Then they took one of those blue, council refuse bags, sprayed it with pepper spray, and took turns covering our faces with the plastic bag.”

According to Bawuti, five officers were torturing Fente, two women and three men. And he was tortured by three male officers.

He said they were then taken to the lounge, where the torture continued. “I think it was the fourth time they suffocated her (Fente) when she said she couldn’t breathe and asked for water before she collapsed. Instead of bringing her water, they took a bottle of beer and poured it on her as she was lying on the ground. They also poured beer on me,” he says.

“I think she took her last breath when she collapsed, because from then on, she was unresponsive. They tried to wake her up, some officers even accused her of pretending.”

Bawuti led the march to the Lingelethu West police station, where the marchers were addressed by complaint coordinator Lieutenant Colonel Klaasen. Klaasen confirmed that some of the police officers involved in the incident were from the Lingelethu West station and were still on active duty.

This caused an uproar in the crowd.

Bawuti told the marchers: “The message that I want you to relay to those police officers is that their family members are alive and comfy while Nonkululo’s body is being prepared to go to the Eastern Cape.”

“If it means that we must take the body and bring it to this station to get accountability and action, that is what we will do. Those officers killed Nonkululo and for three hours they hid this fact. I was taken around this police station after the torture, kept here without being charged, I asked over and over how Nonkululo was and I was told nothing. She was tortured from 7:30pm and the family was only told about her death at 2am.”

“We will not rest till justice is served,” said Bawuti.

In a memorandum handed to Sergeant Xoliswa Nyalambisa, the marchers demanded transparency regarding the police officers responsible for Fente’s death. “You were supposed to protect and arrest her, not kill her,” said the memorandum.

Nyalambisa said: “We are saddened by what has happened, but it is important to understand that we are not the ones investigating this matter, it is the Independent Police Investigative Directorate. This means that there is nothing we as Lingelethu SAPS can do regarding the case docket because we are the suspects.”

He said the station commander was at a meeting but would be given the memorandum.

Fente’s sister, Nontsikelelo Fente, who was visibly distraught at the march, said hearing that the officers who might be responsible for her sister’s death were still on duty broke her.

“It has just been stress after stress. We are already struggling getting our sister’s body to the Eastern Cape because of the red tape of the IPID investigation, now to hear this, it’s just too much,” she said.

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