AGE OF ACCOUNTABILITY: Five criminal cases later, Ekurhuleni fires Julius Mkhwanazi

A year after the Madlanga Commission began peeling back allegations of criminal infiltration and compromised policing, Ekurhuleni has fired Julius Mkhwanazi, the suspended metro police commander whose name has repeatedly surfaced in evidence before the inquiry and in criminal cases.

The City of Ekurhuleni on Friday, 18 September, pulled the plug on the tenure of Deputy Chief of Police Julius Mkhwanazi, whose conduct has come under sustained scrutiny in both criminal proceedings and before the Madlanga Commission of Inquiry into Alleged Criminality, Political Interference and Corruption in the Criminal Justice System .

The City said his termination followed consideration of its internal disciplinary processes, the criminal matters against him and the evidence placed before the commission.

Mkhwanazi, who was responsible for operations and specialised services at the Ekurhuleni Metropolitan Police Department (EMPD) , was suspended on 11 November 2025. This was in line with the recommendations of an internal audit investigation into allegations of misconduct, the City said. The City leadership closely monitored the serious allegations emerging from the Madlanga Commission, it added .

The timing of Mkhwanazi’s firing is significant. The decision came a day after the first anniversary of the Madlanga Commission, when its chair, Justice Mbuyiseli Madlanga, delivered his starkest assessment yet of the evidence before the inquiry – warning that allegations heard by the commission, if established, would point to the infiltration of state institutions and criminality within South Africa’s criminal justice system.

The City’s announcement that it had fired Mkhwanazi came after his appearance with co-accused Keisha-Leigh Stols, Adrian Mackenzie and Kgomotso Makhuba earlier on Friday in the Johannesburg Magistrates’ Court in connection with the alleged theft in Killarney in 2023 of precious stones worth R14-million , one of five separate criminal cases he currently faces.

At the commission, Mkhwanazi’s name has become a recurring thread in evidence concerning the EMPD, with witnesses raising a litany of allegations involving members of the metro police.

A number of the allegations relate to an unlawful memorandum of understanding (MOU) between the metro police department and Vusimuzi “Cat” Matlala’s company, CAT VIP Protection Services.

In his evidence before the commission in November 2025, suspended EMPD Chief Jabulani Isaac Mapiyeye testified that the MOU was fraudulent and that the then Brigadier Mkhwanazi did not have the requisite authority to conclude any MOU on behalf of the City.

Mkhwanazi’s continued incarceration after being denied bail in a murder case also weighed on the City’s decision.