MAIN PHOTO: SULIMAN CARRIM
A PiE SPECIAL REPORT – How a North West businessman went from central witness to the commission’s first criminal referral — a full account of the money, the missed dates and the man at the centre of it all.
Compiled 14 August 2026
Retired Constitutional Court justice Mbuyiseli Madlanga has drawn a line under one of the most disruptive sagas of his commission of inquiry. “That’s the end of the road insofar as us having Mr Carrim before us,” he declared on Friday, 14 August 2026, ordering the commission’s secretary to lay criminal charges against Suliman Carrim — the businessman whose repeated no-shows, medical postponements and courtroom clashes have made him the inquiry’s most talked-about absent witness.
It is a striking milestone. Carrim would be the first witness the Madlanga Commission has moved to have criminally charged over non-appearance, a step Madlanga said was necessary “to protect the integrity” of the inquiry’s processes. What follows is the full story of how it got here: who Carrim is, what the commission’s evidence says about his alleged role in a web of tenders, payments and political access, and the long trail of postponements that finally exhausted the commission’s patience.
Who Is Suliman Carrim?
Suliman (also spelt Suleiman) Carrim is a North West businessman and long-standing ANC member and activist based in Mahikeng, where he is widely known simply as “Suli”. He operates in the private security industry through companies including Fusion Tactical, and has interests spanning several other ventures, among them Ziggy Investment and Tameez, through which some of the disputed payments scrutinised by the commission were channelled.
In Mahikeng, accounts of him are famously divided. Community members who spoke to reporters described a man locals turn to for help and patronage, while others — speaking only on condition of anonymity, citing fear of reprisal from Carrim’s supporters and detractors alike — painted a picture of a small town where “it’s easy to step on someone’s toes,” given how many residents rely on tenders linked to his network.
| Full name | Suliman (Suleiman) Carrim |
| Base | Mahikeng, North West |
| Political affiliation | ANC member / provincial figure |
| Business interests | Private security (Fusion Tactical), Ziggy Investment, Tameez, other ventures |
| Commission status | Witness — first appeared 6 February 2026; testified 9–10 March 2026; has not returned since |
| Latest development | 14 August 2026 — Commission ordered criminal charges over repeated non-appearance |
Day One: A Contested Appearance
Carrim’s relationship with the Madlanga Commission was combative from the outset. Before he had even given evidence, his legal team — led by advocate Kameel Premhid — approached the Gauteng High Court in Johannesburg seeking to interdict the subpoena compelling his appearance. That bid was dismissed on 5 February 2026, clearing the way for him to appear the next day, 6 February.
Even then, Carrim tried to keep his testimony out of public view. Days ahead of the session scheduled for 9 and 10 March, Premhid lodged an urgent application for Carrim’s evidence to be heard in-camera, arguing his client was under surveillance and had received death threats warning him and his family not to testify. One message read out to the commission chillingly referenced Carrim’s dog by name: “Go to the Madlanga Commission and we will show you and your ice boy.”
The commission is going to gamble with my life… it will complete a hat trick.
— Carrim’s camp, referencing the deaths of two prior witnesses linked to the inquiry
The remark backfired badly. Madlanga took strong exception to the suggestion that the commission itself had a “kill rate,” and Premhid was forced to apologise for the language, which the chairperson accepted. Commissioners Sesi Baloyi and Sandile Khumalo also pointedly noted that no evidence tied any threat specifically to Carrim’s upcoming testimony, and that testifying in-camera would not make the alleged threats disappear. In a written ruling, Madlanga found that “nothing jumps out of the pages” of Carrim’s own witness statement to explain why anyone would want to harm him. The in-camera application was refused, and Carrim’s evidence proceeded in open, live-streamed session on 9 and 10 March 2026.
What the Evidence Says: Money, Matlala and a ‘Tangled Web’
Once on the stand, Carrim gave the commission a detailed — and disputed — account of his financial dealings with three figures now central to the inquiry: alleged underworld figure Vusimuzi “Cat” Matlala, North West political fixer Brown Mogotsi, and tender businessman Hangwani “Morgan” Maumela.
The Medicare24 investment
Carrim testified that his involvement began in June 2024, when Matlala — a fellow player in the private security industry — called requesting a meeting after his company, Medicare24, secured a R360-million SAPS contract to provide occupational health and wellness services to roughly 180,000 police officers. Carrim said Matlala, facing cash-flow problems, asked him for financial help, and that he ultimately invested about R10 million in Medicare24 expecting a return.
The payoff never matched the promise, Carrim said: he received only a net R1.7 million to R1.75 million back, leaving him roughly R8.2 million out of pocket. “I lost about R8.2 million. This excludes the profit of the monies advanced to Medicare24,” he told the commission, insisting he had been “played” by Mogotsi and Matlala and had never received kickbacks from the tender.
The Maumela payments and Luthagha Trading
Matlala allegedly then instructed Carrim to pay R750,000 of the returned money to Maumela. Carrim said he refused that specific instruction but agreed instead to pay R500,000 to an entity called Luthagha Trading Enterprise, which he understood to be linked to Maumela’s sister, after Maumela asserted control over the account.
Evidence placed before the commission showed this was far from an isolated payment. Carrim’s company Ziggy Investment reportedly paid Luthagha Trading more than R42 million between December 2023 and November 2024, while Tameez paid the entity a further R3 million-plus between August 2024 and March 2025 — transactions evidence leaders have said resemble, when taken together, patterns associated with money-laundering rather than routine business.
Denials and other claims
Carrim firmly denied any relationship with suspended police minister Senzo Mchunu and rejected suggestions that he tried to use political influence to help Matlala secure the SAPS tender or that he received kickbacks. He also testified that Mogotsi, not Matlala, was the one who knew about certain payments first, and separately told the commission he first crossed paths with Maumela back in 2022, after unknowingly buying a Johannesburg property from him the previous year.
Named by Others: The Case Against Him
Carrim’s own testimony forms only part of the picture. He has also been directly implicated by other witnesses central to the inquiry — among them the anonymous Witness X, Brown Mogotsi, and senior police officers Lieutenant-General Dumisani Khumalo and Lieutenant-General Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi, whose explosive allegations of criminal infiltration in policing gave the commission its name.
Their evidence, along with alleged chat messages placed before the commission, has linked Carrim to Matlala, Mogotsi and a further figure, Julius Mkhwanazi, and included claims that he received money in exchange for passing on sensitive police information — allegations Carrim has consistently denied.
- Accused of using political influence to help Matlala’s Medicare24 secure the R360m SAPS tender
- Alleged to have received kickbacks linked to that tender — denied by Carrim
- Implicated in leaking sensitive police intelligence to Matlala — denied by Carrim
- Named by Witness X, Mogotsi, Lt-Gen Khumalo and Lt-Gen Mkhwanazi in connection with the syndicate the commission is probing
- Financial flows via Ziggy Investment and Tameez to Luthagha Trading described by evidence leaders as resembling a possible money-laundering pattern
The Duck and Dive: A Timeline of Delay
If Carrim’s testimony troubled the commission, his subsequent absence troubled it more. What began as a single medical postponement stretched into a five-month standoff, marked by contested hospital claims, a sighting at a supermarket, a subpoenaed doctor and, finally, a refused independent medical assessment.
5 Feb 2026 Gauteng High Court dismisses Carrim’s bid to interdict his subpoena to appear.
6 Feb 2026 Carrim’s first appearance before the commission.
6 Mar 2026 Application for in-camera testimony lodged, citing death threats; commission questions the “kill rate” remark.
9–10 Mar 2026 In-camera bid refused. Carrim testifies in open session about Medicare24, Matlala, Mogotsi and Maumela.
12 Mar 2026 Carrim reportedly suffers a heart attack at a gym, two days before he is due to resume evidence.
14 Apr 2026 Commission grants a postponement; Carrim is said to be admitted to Milpark Hospital and does not return to the stand.
Late Jun 2026 A further scheduled appearance is postponed again on medical grounds.
15 Jul 2026 Carrim fails to appear as expected; questions mount after claims he was seen out in public — including reportedly at a Woolworths store — despite being declared medically unfit. Commission moves to subpoena his doctor and seek CCTV footage.
29 Jul 2026 Commission rules Carrim must undergo an independent medical assessment if he wishes to be excused from testifying.
11 Aug 2026 Carrim allegedly experiences a further medical incident, cited as the reason an assessment report was only submitted the next day.
14 Aug 2026 Carrim again fails to appear and has not submitted to the ordered independent assessment. Madlanga declares the commission has reached “the end of the road” and orders criminal charges to be laid.
Throughout, Carrim’s legal team maintained that the postponement requests were genuine and medically grounded, and objected strenuously when evidence leader Adila Hassim sought detailed disclosure of his hospitalisation dates and recent travel history, calling it an improper attempt to undermine “unimpugned medical evidence.” The commission was not persuaded that the objections outweighed its need to verify Carrim’s condition independently.
CAPTION: MADLANGA COMMISSION EVIDENCE LEADER ADVOCATE ADILA HASSIM
‘The End of the Road’: Why the Commission Acted
By 14 August, the commission’s patience had run out. Evidence leader Adila Hassim asked Madlanga to formally record Carrim’s non-attendance and refer the matter for possible breaches of the Commissions Act and its regulations, arguing that the inquiry should now proceed on the evidence already before it rather than wait indefinitely for a witness who had declined an independent medical assessment specifically ordered to test his claims.
If the commission were not to do that, it would itself not be taking its processes seriously. Otherwise, witnesses will choose to come or not come to testify willy-nilly.
— Justice Mbuyiseli Madlanga, commission chairperson
Madlanga instructed commission secretary Dr Nolitha Vukuza to formally set the criminal process in motion. He was clear that the door has not been closed on Carrim’s side of the story altogether: if Carrim has a defence to offer, Madlanga said, he is free to raise it during the criminal proceedings that follow. But as far as the commission itself is concerned, its dealings with him are over — his March testimony stands as the last word the inquiry will hear from him directly, and the commission will draw its conclusions on the outstanding, unanswered questions — including requested financial statements he never supplied — from the record as it stands.
What Happens Next
- A criminal charge will be laid against Carrim, believed to relate to non-compliance with the Commissions Act and its regulations governing witness attendance.
- The commission will proceed to draw findings from the evidence already on record, including Carrim’s March testimony and material from witnesses who implicated him.
- Outstanding requests — including Carrim’s financial statements — are likely to remain unanswered within the commission process itself.
- Carrim’s legal team retains the right to contest any charge and to raise a defence through the ordinary criminal justice process, separate from the commission.
- The commission itself is working against its own deadline, having been due to deliver a second interim report by 29 May 2026 ahead of final findings targeted for the end of August 2026.
The Bigger Picture
Carrim’s saga has become a case study in the challenges facing South Africa’s commission-of-inquiry model: a chairperson with the power to subpoena but limited direct enforcement tools when a reluctant witness deploys medical claims, legal applications and procedural objections to stay away. Whether the coming criminal process succeeds in doing what months of rulings could not — bringing Suliman Carrim back to account for the money trail bearing his name — will be watched closely, both in Mahikeng and far beyond it.
For now, the Madlanga Commission has closed its chapter on him as a witness. What comes next, in a courtroom rather than a commission hearing room, is a story still to be written.
Compiled from public reporting on the Madlanga Commission of Inquiry, including Daily Maverick, The Citizen, eNCA, SABC News, EWN, IOL, Sunday World, TimesLive, The Witness, Briefly News, Business Day and Jacaranda FM, as at 14 August 2026. This report reflects allegations and evidence led before the commission; Suliman Carrim denies wrongdoing and no criminal or commission finding of guilt has yet been made against him.
