Brown Mogotsi allegedly too ill to attend Madlanga hearings

Controversial North West businessman Brown Mogotsi is in contempt of a subpoena to appear before the Madlanga commission of inquiry after not showing up on Monday, citing ill health without providing a medical certificate.

Mogotsi was scheduled to return to the commission on Monday but did not. Chief evidence leader Matthew Chaskalson said the commission was informed Mogotsi was not well but had not yet submitted a medical certificate confirming this.

Chaskalson said Mogotsi made a commitment to submit the medical certificate later on Monday. He asked the commission to wait until it receives the sick note before taking a decision against Mogotsi.

Commission chair justice Mbuyiseli Madlanga said that without a sick note before the commission, Mogotsi was in contempt of the commission’s subpoena. The commission would, however, wait before taking legal action against Mogotsi until the consideration of the medical certificate.

“At present and until we have a medical certificate, Mr Mogotsi is in contempt. Our idea was to say because he is in contempt from where we are sitting, we are going to have the commission initiate the necessary legal processes against him.

“It is purely because of the request that you [Chaskalson] have made that we will not immediately have those processes initiated,” Madlanga said.

Being in contempt of a subpoena can lead to a criminal prosecution, fine or imprisonment.

Chaskalson said though Mogotsi previously appeared before the commission, there were more issues the commission wanted to address with him that he had not testified about.

Mogotsi faces allegations of receiving large sums of money from Vusimuzi “Cat” Matlala under the impression that he had the power to influence police minister Senzo Mchunu to make decisions in Matlala’s favour.

Matlala’s Medicare24 company had a R360m tender with the police. Mogotsi also faces allegations of leaking internal police documents to Matlala.

Mogotsi is not the first witness to skip testimony on the scheduled date, citing ill health. Last week Madlanga commission of inquiry commissioner Sesi Baloyi proposed that evidence leaders consider subpoenaing doctors to testify after a witness who was meant to testify on Wednesday filed a last-minute and unclear sick note.

The witness, whose name is being withheld for safety reasons, works with crime intelligence agents and informants. Mogotsi testified he was an intelligence informant.

Last month, the commission had to postpone the testimony of Witness F, a police officer who worked closely with deputy police commissioner Shadrack Sibiya, due to hospitalisation.

Witness F testified for about two days, but testimony was halted midway for health reasons.

The commission is in a race against time. It has a deadline of March 16 to conclude hearings.