The man who stabbed Chris Hani’s killer

A carpenter and model prisoner who mostly kept to himself and always followed instructions.

Thus the man accused of stabbing Janusz Waluś was described by those who know Mandla Samuel Madonsela, former SA Air Force sergeant and MK cadre.

Madonsela is said to be the man who stabbed Chris Hani’s killer on Tuesday afternoon with a sharp object he may have smuggled from the woodworking shop where he works.

An insider at the prison workshop where Madonsela works as a carpenter described the 52-year-old as a calm person who kept to herself and worked when necessary.

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“We were all shocked that he did this. He is a very hard-working person, hands-on and knows how to follow instructions,”

The Sowetan said Madonsela may have used a pair of scissors he smuggled out of the workshop into the cells. “The workshop has many loopholes. There is no proper inventory list of equipment, so when something goes missing it goes unnoticed.”

Madonsela was said to be angry that a group of inmates sided with Waluś in their first release attempt, saying they could not be on the same side as the person who killed their comrade.

Madonsela was a member of the Lifer Committee, a group representing inmates serving life sentences and seeking parole.

You are serving a life sentence after being convicted of the murder of your fellow Lieutenant Colonel Dominic Stevens and wounding Lieutenant Colonel Isak Karan at Thaba Tshwane Air Force College on November 8, 2007.

Stevens had allegedly told him he was a “redundant k*****” who joined the SA Air Force due to the mercy of politics and that the force was not there to train politicians but soldiers.

Last Monday, the Constitutional Court ordered Justice and Corrections Minister Ronald Lamola to release Waluś within 10 days.

Waluś was found guilty of the 1993 assassination of an anti-apartheid activist and General Secretary of the SA Communist Party

Marchers in SACP and ANC regalia could be heard screaming that Madonsela should be awarded the highest order in the country for doing “courageous and revolutionary work”.

SACP general secretary Solly Mapaila revealed the party had filed an application to reverse the ConCourt judgment that released Waluś on parole.

Mapaila said if Waluś can’t be kept behind bars, they want him to spend his parole in SA and not be deported back to his home country of Poland.

Mapaila labelled Waluś an “unrepentant criminal”.

“We’re opposed to parole on the grounds that he’s not been remorseful, he remains an unrepentant criminal assassin who had never engaged in a victim-offender dialogue with the family and asked for forgiveness.

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“He never followed in those processes yet he had managed to mischievously abuse the law.

“This is unacceptable, he never apologised. We as communists, our rights are not protected. The constitution must protect our rights. This court has created a massive precedent in terms in how we treat criminals” Mapaila said.

Waluś was previously stabbed in 2018.

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