Vusimusi ‘Cat’ Matlala has withdrawn from a plea and sentence agreement with the state and will go on trial on charges of fraud, corruption, and money laundering instead. Matlala appeared briefly in the Pretoria Specialised Commercial Crime Court yesterday, reports News24.

The now-stillborn deal would have seen him sentenced to an effective 12 years of direct imprisonment, a leniency in exchange for his testimony against high-ranking police officers and influential politicians implicated in his tainted R360m SAPS tender.

The deal, brokered by the Investigating Directorate Against Corruption (Idac), was scuppered before Magistrate Ignatius Du Preez.

As Matlala stood in the dock, his lawyer, Advocate Annelene van den Heever, rose to her feet and tersely said that her client had withdrawn from the deal.

When she did so, a bewildered Matlala asked the court for an adjournment so he could consult his legal team and returned 10 minutes later with Van den Heever at his shoulder to confirm that he would no longer participate.

In an earlier court appearance, Du Preez described Matlala as having a ‘corrupt, deceptive and devious mind’.

It was Matlala, Du Preez held, that had orchestrated the formation of Medicare 24 Tswane District, the vehicle through which he would bid for the tender, and then corruptly co-opted high-ranking police officers to ensure he won.

Matlala and his co-accused will remain in custody, reports the Mail & Guardian.

Speaking outside court, NPA spokesperson Kaizer Kganyago said the prosecution accepted the court's ruling and would continue with the case through the regular trial process.

‘Definitely, it has collapsed. Obviously, there's a ruling now that the plea agreement is null and void and we really have to accept what the court has indicated,’ Kganyago said.

‘Because now the plea has been deemed to be null and void, nothing that was in that plea can be used. Therefore, we have got to continue with our own investigations,’ he said.

Kganyago said the proposed agreement included an affidavit from Matlala that reportedly implicated senior police officials in an alleged rogue tender scheme.

Kganyago said the state would ask the court to rejoin Matlala as accused number one in the main criminal matter when the case returned to court in September. 

He said the prosecution's case was not entirely dependent on the plea agreement.

‘We had already arrested people who were involved in this and therefore, we arrested them on the basis of the evidence we had against them,’ Kganyago said.

Full News24 report

Full Mail & Guardian report