Mpho Mafole was an Ekurhuleni auditor who flagged irregularities in a R1.8 billion chemical toilets tender in the days before his murder on 30 June 2025.

This visual investigation sets out how Mafole was tracked and eliminated.

His findings were critical and called into question the process underpinning a nearly R2 billion tender.

A silver Toyota Avanza carrying four assassins tailed him from the moment he left his parents’ house.

Unbeknown to Mafole, he had been marked for death. Oblivious to the threat, he nosed his car through traffic.

A blanket of CCTV cameras across the city logged Mafole’s travels and placed the hitmen sent to kill him on his heels.

CCTV cameras on the hotel’s perimeter show the hitmen hiding in plain sight, blending in with e-hailing vehicles at the roadside.

It had been a long day for the auditor. As he navigated the commute homeward, he called his fiancée. She missed the last call he would make to her.

On 20 July the South African Police Service arrested Thabani Ntshalintshali for the murder. They also named Hlanganani Agripper Mncwango as the second suspect. He remains at large. The vehicle used in the murder belongs to Mncwango. It has not been recovered.

Ntshalintshali made a bail application appearance in the Kempton Park Regional Magistrates’ Court on 14 October. He will return to the court on 31 October. The court has linked the Mafole murder case with that of the murder of Bongani Mfihlo, a DJ who was gunned down at a nightclub in Kempton Park in September 2023.

When Ntshalintshali was arrested, it emerged that he had been released on bail.