Court orders activist Joel Letwaba to apologise to former deputy president David Mabuza

The Mbombela high court has ordered activist Joel Pompies Letwaba to apologise to former deputy president David Mabuza for making defamatory statements about him on national television in 2021.

The Mbombela high court has ordered activist Joel Pompies Letwaba to apologise to former deputy president David Mabuza for making defamatory statements about him on national television in 2021.

Letwaba alleged that Mabuza was at the centre of assassination attempts and murders in Mpumalanga’s political circles and that he was the cause of problems in the country and within the ruling ANC.

Furthermore, Letwaba accused Mabuza of killing whistle-blowers, referring to him as the country’s most feared politician, who caused criminal cases against him to disappear.

Mabuza launched an application with the high court after statements Letwaba made in two interviews with news channels eNCA and Newzroom Afrika in February and October 2021.

In a judgment handed down on Wednesday, Judge Brian Mashile found the statements to be defamatory. 

“The defences of the truth and public interest and fair comment do not stand,” Mashile said.

The former deputy president’s attorney, Stein Scop, sent a letter to Letwaba on 25 November 2021 warning him he faced a high court application if he did not stop accusing Mabuza of “unfounded allegations”.

Mashile said Letwaba was interdicted and restrained from making any oral or written statements publicly suggesting that Mabuza was responsible for ordering the killing of people while premier of Mpumalanga, among other assertions.

The judge also ordered Letwaba to pay legal costs for the court application and directed that Letwaba issue a public apology to Mabuza and to approach eNCA, Newzroom Afrika and The Citizen newspaper within 14 days of the court order to arrange for the airing and publication of the apology.

Mashile stipulated that the apology read: “On 3 February 2021 and 18 October 2021, I publicly stated, on interviews given on Newzroom Afrika and eNCA respectively, that Mr David Mabuza, the deputy president of South Africa and the African National Congress, was responsible for political killings in Mpumalanga Province and made related allegations. I made these statements without evidence and I appreciate that they are false. In the circumstances, I unreservedly retract the statements which I made and apologise to the deputy president for having made them.”