The name of controversial businessman Vusimusi “Cat” Matlala has haunted proceedings in South Africa’s major investigation into allegations of police corruption.
The 49-year-old was accused of providing generous gifts – including 20 impalas, the weight-loss drug Ozempic and personal loans – to help him buy influence and secure police contracts.
In custody for more than a year in connection with another case, Matlala was due to give his version of events before retired Constitutional Court judge Mbuyiseli Madlanga and his jury on Wednesday. But after appearing in person before the commissioners for two hours, it was agreed that he would begin his testimony in earnest in September.
The revelations of the Madlanga Commission, underway for 10 months, have gripped South Africans and they are eager to know Matlala’s reaction.
Wearing a Fendi shirt and Gucci glasses, Matlala actually gave evidence at a parallel corruption inquiry in Parliament last November.
He said he did not personally know senior police officials and politicians and denied allegations of corruption, while admitting to making donations for activities linked to the African National Congress (ANC), the main party in the coalition government.
But he has not yet been asked to respond to the wider allegations made at the Madlanga Commission or the accusation that he was part of a drug trafficking cartel, allegedly known as the Big Five.
Matlala may be a central figure today, but he only became known to the public three years ago, when his name was mentioned in news reports about alleged irregularities in a public hospital tender – although he said he had nothing to do with the tender.
What little is known about his childhood is based on what he said in Parliament last year.
He was born in 1976, when South Africa was still ruled by a white minority government, and grew up in a township east of the capital, Pretoria.
He told lawmakers he was raised for a time by a single mother, who he said then “disappeared on me.”
“I had to raise myself. In fact, I was a street child,” he told lawmakers.
He finally reunited with his mother in 2002, when she was terminally ill.
After her death, Matlala learned that she had been sexually assaulted, which he believed was due to her albinism. Myths surrounding this disease include people believing that having sex with a woman with this disease would cure men of the disease.
After leaving school, he said he started an informal business to make ends meet, which led him into various run-ins with the law.
In 2001, he was convicted and served time in prison for possession of stolen property.
Over the years, he was arrested for a series of crimes, including home invasions, cash-in-transit theft and assault. He denied any involvement in these matters and was either acquitted or the charges against him were dropped.
He told the parliamentary committee that his nickname “Cat” was not due, as some have suggested, to his “nine lives” and his ability to survive trouble, but to his large family: he has nine children with his wife.
But things caught up with him in May 2025 when he was arrested and charged with attempted murder, which he denies. His wife is accused of the same crime and also denies this accusation. Unlike her husband, she was released on bail.
He was later charged with corruption over allegations related to providing health services to police – and pleaded guilty last month as part of a deal with prosecutors. but has since withdrawn his plea as the deal collapsed.
He told last year’s parliamentary inquiry that he changed his life in 2017, when he registered his first formal business providing security services.
Matlala said he later expanded his services into health care, landing him lucrative contracts, first with a hospital and then with the police, even though, as he admitted to lawmakers, he had no track record of providing health services.
But since last September, as witnesses gave evidence to the Madlanga Commission, allegations that Matlala had close and corrupt relationships with senior police officers have emerged in the public domain.
This included allegations that now-suspended Police Minister Senzo Mchunu was indirectly receiving campaign money from Matlala to fund his “political efforts”. Mchunu has denied the accusations.
Matlala was also accused of having affairs with Mchunu’s predecessor, Bheki Cele.
Matlala told the parliamentary inquiry that he paid Cele a “facilitation fee” of 500,000 rand ($31,000; £23,000), which the latter demanded after police returned the firearms seized from Matlala.
The businessman claimed Cele also made other requests, including help to buy a house and pay for her son’s education, which Matlala refused to grant.
Cele admitted to MPs that he had known Matlala for a few months and had twice stayed at her rented penthouse in Pretoria, but denied receiving money from Matlala.
Matlala’s alleged relationships with other senior police officers were also raised before the Madlanga Commission.
Squad Rachel Matjeng, who oversaw the controversial police contract awarded to Matlala, told the commission she had an on-and-off romance with the businessman that included lavish romantic gifts, among them photos of Ozempic.
Another senior officer, the head of the police’s organized crime unit, Major General Richard Shibiri, admitted receiving a $4,000 “personal loan” from Matlala which he repaid.
Shibiri, who oversaw anti-gang, narcotics and illegal mining investigations, among other things, said the money was intended for repairs to his son’s car. He denied having a close friendship with Matlala, although he often spoke to him and advised him on personal matters.
“At no time did I know that he was a member of a cartel or that he was under criminal investigation,” he said.
Shibiri and Matjeng have since been dismissed from the police force.
Matlala’s name has also been mentioned in connection with an alleged scandal in Ekurhuleni, a local government area just east of Johannesburg.
It was alleged that while Julius Mkhwanazi was Ekurhuleni’s acting police chief, he had blue lights and sirens installed on Matlala’s personal vehicles.
Mkhwanazi, who has since been suspended, denied the allegations but admitted receiving money from Matlala, describing him as a “blood brother” when he appeared before the Madlanga Commission.
The startling revelations that have emerged since September, when the Madlanga Commission began, have left people wondering how such things could have happened.
Many South Africans, keen to understand the mechanics of the alleged corruption, hope that on September 1, Matlala may have the answers.
