Letter to Mahlamba Ndlopfu: Hail, Mr Brown — a mogul who hustles in magistrates’ corridors and high court passages

My leader, Mr Brown may not be a Sandton tycoon, but he is every inch a legitimate entrepreneur and philanthropist — at least on paper and court papers.

By Bhekisisa Mncube

2 Oct 2025

Ah, Chief Dwasaho! Our faithful servants of the people, the Champions, are hiding in plain sight, yet instead of laurel wreaths and brass bands, we gather only to mourn. As a nation, we seem to protest too much. Take that relic of yesteryear, Tony Leon, still foaming at the mouth about “State Capture”, “requests”, “donations” and racial quotas. Leon is, without doubt, a man of little faith.

Brown: Mud after rain or spilt coffee?

Stage left, enter our newly minted national hero: Brown Mogotsi, allegedly cast as the puppet master at the centre of South Africa’s criminal justice capture. Bullsh*t. But, my leader, let us pause at the baptismal font, the naming regime: Brown. Not even Green, not even Golden. Brown. What possesses a parent to christen their bundle of joy with the colour of mud after rain, or spilt coffee? What parent gazes at a newborn and declares, “Brown you shall be, whatever you desire, my son”? Perhaps they knew, prophetically, that their son would one day make a career of rolling in it.

Our Mr Brown is a friend and foe of our newest National Key Point, Vusimuzi “Cat” Matlala. We can confirm he (Brown) is neither an associate nor friend of the on leave Minister of Police, Senzo Mchunu.

Reliable lies

Sadly, the standards of our journalism continue their downward spiral. Eyewitness News (EWN), that aberration pretending to be a newsroom, claimed without so much as a docket number that it had “reliably learnt” Mr Brown carries multiple files for assault, theft, fraud and defeating the ends of justice. They say “reliably told” as if gossip at the carwash now counts as investigative rigour.

Then came Correctional Services spokesperson Singabakho Nxumalo, who told another rag, TimesLive, with a flair for fake news that Mr Brown’s CV includes six months for defeating the ends of justice, six months for assault GBH, and three to five years for assault GBH and reckless driving. All sentences have expired, yet EWN delivered it deadpan, as though the expiry date on a criminal sentence is the same as the best-before date on a carton of milk.

Of hangovers and cash flows

Naysayers aside, the truth is Mr Brown may not be a Sandton tycoon, but he is every inch a legitimate entrepreneur and philanthropist, at least on paper and court papers. Mr Brown’s empire rises from bar counters and greasy tables. They say he is in the hospitality (catering for the whims of the powerful) industry. The man owns two businesses: a bottle store and a restaurant. Thus, he has perfected the art of turning hangovers into cash flow and lunch plates into balance sheets.

And yes, my leader, the “hospitality mogul” gig is no stunt. The Brown Mogotsi Foundation is on record as dragging the North West Health Department to court over a catering services tender awarded to the wrong Comrade. And the judge, bless his gavel, agreed: “The First Respondent is hereby interdicted and restrained from in any way implementing the decision to award the [catering] tender.”

Hail, Mr Brown! Legends aren’t born; they are manufactured in the rough and tumble of tender fracases, on the granite steps of our courts, and in the midnight hum of WhatsApp and Signal message tones. This is no ordinary mogul. Where others hustle in Sandton glass towers, Mr Brown hustles in magistrates’ corridors and High Court passages, armed not with balance sheets but with “prayers”, “requests”, and demands for “donations”.

Brown envelopes

My leader, the beauty of Mr Brown, is that he also understands the modern economy that runs on brown envelopes better than Mr Leon. He knows what sociologists call the modern gig economy, without aesthetic labour, without prose, yet the real one. In his gibberish words, it works.

Brown’s investment metrics are measured in percentages: the first tranche, 25%; airline tickets; and the balance, 75%, which is delivered later. Occasionally, Mr Brown “requests: a “donation”. (Yes, Mr Leon, an economy runs on donations and requests.) Sometimes it’s R37,000, sometimes he is short by R12,500, or R10,000 here, R15,000 there.

Not the fake numbers paraded at the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE), nor the GDP figures that mean little to the man on the ground. What does the JSE breaching 107,000 for the first time, as gold stocks shine, or a feeble 0.8% quarter-on-quarter GDP growth, slightly better than economists’ 0.5% prediction, mean to people struggling daily like “Cat” Matlala and, of course, Mr Brown?

Cost of democracy

And what do these numbers add to the two ANC regions in the North West that scrambled to raise R12,000 for membership fees to attend a conference and “elect” new leaders? Please don't be foolish and ask why members can’t pay their fees. Have you seen the unemployment numbers lately?

No, his (Mr Brown’s) is the economy of palm greasing, influence peddling, fake news factories, and running errands for the powerful, especially the understaffed and poorly funded South African Police Service (SAPS). He is a graduate of the Shadow State Academy.

My leader, most journalists are bereft of savvy and pashasha, lazily describing Mr Brown as a convicted thug. In truth, he is the Shakespeare of broken English and a summa cum laude graduate of the Shadow State Academy.

WhatsApp economics

His sermons are not found in Hansard or Treasury notes, but are scribbled on WhatsApp, typed with greasy fingers, and punctuated with emojis. To avoid the Loyal Five accusing me of embroidery, I, too, witnessed the theatre live on telly this week. The chats form part of a tranche of 424 explosive exchanges between attempted murder accused Cat Matlala and Mr Brown, unveiled as evidence by none other than the police’s Crime Intelligence head, Lieutenant-General Dumisani Khumalo, at the Madlanga Commission of Inquiry.

But can we really trust a man whose own cats and dogs cross the street when they see him? A general of shadows, whispering names without surnames, as if we must all bow to his footnotes in the dark. My leader, this is a Shakespearean tragedy playing out in data bundles and blue ticks.

Be merry

Here is a taste, in case you missed it. On Christmas Day, while the nation carved turkeys, Mr Brown was carving threats: “If you don’t make the payment by tomorrow, December 26, 2024, at noon, we’ll have to prioritise the next available client.” The Cat subsequently paid an outstanding amount of R111,000.

On New Year’s Day, while we nursed hangovers and swore never to touch Russian Bear again, Mr Brown was already in full intelligence brief mode. He informed Cat Matlala, with the gravitas of a spaza-shop spymaster, that the so-called Political Killings Task Team, the very unit that had allegedly “harassed” him at his house, had been disbanded.

And when Cat Matlala’s SAPS R360-million windfall contract slipped away, our Mr Brown brushed it off with the wisdom of a shebeen philosopher: “We can’t lose a contract when so many people are looking for tenders.”

And when bribery danced near the firelight, our loyal and resourceful Mr Brown was quick with his poetic guidance: “Arrange with Khan to give him cash if the information he has is worth it.” According to Lieutenant-General Khumalo, Khan is none other than Major-General Feroz Khan, the SAPS’ head of counterintelligence. Convenient, isn’t it, when the hunter and the hunted wear the same uniform?

Our alleged spy chief, Lieutenant-General Khumalo, read these WhatsApps with the relish of a first-year English Literature student discovering George Orwell for the first time. Yet, in his own testimony, he admitted that in the Eastern Cape, his team of spies staged a robbery, walking out of Crime Intelligence offices with R1.3-million, only to be caught. A spy commits a crime and is caught; what sort of cloak-and-dagger farce is this?

Gospel, according to Mr Brown

This only fortifies my belief that Mr Brown’s generosity cannot be sneered at. Our Crime Intelligence needs all hands on deck. My leader, with his remarkable skills in accessing Persal data, BAS records, and Crime Intelligence documents, all remotely, Mr Brown should already be wearing the crown of spy chief. That, my leader, is Brown’s scripture, less Gospel of Matthew, more Gospel according to Metadata, where every blue tick, missed call and forwarded invoice becomes a sacred scroll of the Shadow State.

Till next week, my man. Send me to Mr Brown for a cold one, it’s been a long week. DM

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