CHARLES MATSEKE | Suleiman Carrim and the Madlanga Commission's oligarchic revelation 

The appearance of North West businessman and ANC provincial treasurer Suleiman Carrim before the Madlanga Commission of Inquiry was meant to clarify allegations surrounding organised crime and corruption within South Africa’s law enforcement and procurement systems.

Instead, it illuminated something far more troubling; the emergence of a tightly woven network linking political influence, municipal resources and private capital.

Carrim’s testimony was marked by confrontation.

Another confrontation followed when Premhid made the extraordinary claim that the commission itself was “killing witnesses”, a statement for which he was later forced to apologise.

These episodes were not merely theatrical interruptions. They reflected a broader strategy of resistance that has become familiar in inquiries examining elite misconduct: challenge the process, delay the proceedings and question the mandate of investigators.

But beneath the procedural skirmishes lay a far more consequential set of revelations.

Evidence presented before the commission suggests that Carrim sits at the centre of a criminal network connecting several controversial figures, among them Hangwani Maumela, Vusimuzi “Cat” Matlala, Brown Mogotsi and Binjani Chauke.

Together, these relationships begin to reveal the contours of what investigators increasingly describe as a syndicate operating across the boundaries of politics, business and organised crime.

One of the most striking elements of Carrim’s testimony concerns the flow of public money.

Records before the commission indicate that more than R330-million in municipal payments from a North West municipality where Carrim holds significant political influence ultimately flowed to companies linked to him and the Maumela-Matlala syndicate.

Some of these transactions intersect with the business interests of individuals already under scrutiny by the Special Investigating Unit.

Among them is Brown Mogotsi, a North West businessman widely described in political circles as an “ANC fixer”. Mogotsi played a significant role in the 2017 CR17 presidential campaign, a fact Carrim himself acknowledged during testimony.

The political implications of that connection are difficult to ignore.

If accurate, such interventions illustrate the ease with which political proximity can be converted into institutional protection.

Yet it is the financial relationships linking Carrim to the Maumela–Matlala criminal syndicate that most clearly illustrate the scale of the problem.

The Madlanga Commission has documented what evidence leaders described as a “tangled web” of transactions between Carrim, Hangwani Maumela and Vusimuzi “Cat” Matlala. Transactions that investigators believe may point to money-laundering activities.

Carrim told the commission that he first encountered Maumela in 2022 after unknowingly purchasing a Johannesburg property from him the previous year.

What followed, however, suggests that their relationship quickly evolved into something more substantial.

The two men later explored a R100-million chrome mining venture known as Chrome Core, a project that reportedly involved the transfer of approximately R56-million from Maumela to Carrim.

In addition, Carrim acknowledged paying more than R42-million between 2023 and 2024 to a company linked to Maumela’s sister.

Such figures would raise eyebrows in any jurisdiction. Within the broader context of the commission’s investigation, they begin to resemble pieces of a much larger puzzle.

That puzzle also includes the healthcare procurement network linked to Matlala.

Evidence presented to the commission revealed that Carrim was connected to financial flows involving Medicare24, a company associated with Matlala.

An initial investment of roughly R10-million was reportedly made into the company through channels linked to Carrim’s associates, including the wife of Mogotsi.

This was followed by an additional payment of approximately R2-million to the same enterprise.

Individually, such transactions might be dismissed as routine business dealings. Taken together, they begin to resemble something else entirely.

What emerges from the Madlanga Commission is the outfit of a network in which political figures, businessmen and intermediaries appear to operate within a shared ecosystem of influence and elite impunity.

Within that ecosystem, public contracts become private revenue streams, and political proximity becomes a form of economic capital.

The line separating public office from private enrichment begins to dissolve.

This is the quiet cartelisation of the state.

The Maumela syndicate illustrates the scale of this transformation.

The Special Investigating Unit’s raids on Maumela’s Sandton mansion reportedly uncovered luxury vehicles, artwork and other assets worth hundreds of millions of rand, wealth investigators believe was derived from hospital procurement contracts connected to the Tembisa Hospital scandal exposed by whistle-blower Babita Deokaran.

According to the SIU, at least 41 suppliers linked to Maumela benefited from those contracts.

But Maumela himself is not the anomaly.

He is one node in a wider system.

The Carrim testimony reveals how such networks function: political figures provide access, intermediaries manage relationships and private companies convert public resources into private wealth.

What the Madlanga Commission has uncovered, therefore, is not simply corruption in the conventional sense.

It is the emergence of syndicated governance.

In such a system, the state does not merely tolerate corruption, it becomes the terrain on which competing networks of power organise themselves.

The ultimate question raised by Carrim’s testimony is therefore not whether individual actors will face consequences.

It is whether South Africa’s institutions still possess the capacity to dismantle the oligarchic networks that now appear embedded within them?