Termination of Mangaung prison contract case delayed

The legal battle between the department of correctional services and a private company contracted to run the Mangaung correctional centre, from where convicted murderer and rapist Thabo Bester escaped, has been delayed.

On Tuesday, the high court in Pretoria handed down judgment in an application brought by security company G4S, in which it sought the court to allow it to participate in the main application over the department's notice to Bloemfontein Correctional Contracts [BCC] to terminate its contract after Bester's escape in May 2022.

In her judgment, judge Elizabeth Mamoloko Kubushi said: “It is common cause that the second respondent [G4S, a subcontractor to BCC] is not party to the concession agreement [between the department and BCC]...

"It is on the basis of the aforementioned reasons that it is found that the second respondent cannot be allowed to seek relief against the first respondent [DCS] as it seeks to do in the heads of argument.

"In fact, it should not be allowed to participate in these proceedings at all...”

Bester escaped from the Mangaung correctional centre after setting his cell on fire and staging his death, with the help of his partner Dr Nandipha Magudumana and several other people who are now his co-accused.  

He was arrested alongside Magudumana in Tanzania in April 2023. 

The department served a notice to terminate the contract in 2023. The contract is due to expire in June 2026.

Minutes after the judgment was handed down, G4S senior counsel Bruce Leech told the court that they had filed an application for leave to appeal. 

“We are persisting with the urgent application for leave to appeal, and we have filed it, and it is before the court. The appeal will suspend the judgment handed over today.

"There is no order or merits for the main application. If we are refused an appeal, we will argue that the main application should not continue in our absence,” he said. 

Kubushi granted G4S leave to appeal.

“I am of the view that the application before me needs supplemented affidavits, and I will need more arguments from other parties, and I prefer them in writing. Other parties should be given the opportunity to document their heads of argument. 

"Therefore, I postpone this matter, and the main application is postponed, and costs are reserved,” she said.