Journalist Marianne Thamm’s home office was ransacked in March 2021. Two months earlier, Crime Intelligence officers allegedly exchanged messages about her, one saying action needed to be taken against her. (Photo: Supplied) Crime Intelligence resources may have been used against Daily Maverick journalist Marianne Thamm, the Madlanga Commission of Inquiry heard on Monday, 6 July 2026.
The first part of the commission proceedings on Monday focused on messages between Crime Intelligence officers dating back to January 2021 and on a burglary at Thamm’s home in Cape Town a couple of months later, in March.
Evidence leader, advocate Adila Hassim SC, said that while police had essentially closed the burglary case, “the sequencing” and “the timing” of the messages and the break-in mean that further investigation was warranted.
‘Crime Intelligence intimidation danger’
While there was no conclusive link between the messages and the burglary, Hassim emphasised that Crime Intelligence is “not a mechanism for monitoring and intimidating anyone, including journalists”.
She said that when journalists did not report matters accurately, there were avenues in place to address it, including approaching editors.
/file/attachments/2990/MarianneThammspeaksattheStellenboschUniversityDepartmentofJournalismGraduationCelebrationPhotographerAnsoThom_921860.jpg "Marianne Thamm speaks at the Stellenbosch University Department of Journalism Graduation Celebration. ((Photo: Anso Thom)")
Hassim added: “We appreciate in the constitutional democracy that journalists play an important role in exposing wrongdoing within public institutions, including in the police.
“So, the broader systemic concern that I just wish to place before the commission is that the exchange reflects a danger that Crime Intelligence could be used for factional or personal and retaliatory purposes, and that is something that we should take note of in the commission.”
Feroz Khan and Crime Intelligence
Feroz Khan is attached to the South African Police Service’s tumultuous Crime Intelligence unit, which has been consistently dogged by allegations and suspicions of secret fund looting and corruption. KwaZulu-Natal police commissioner Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi, who initially made drug cartel infiltration accusations that gave rise to the Madlanga Commission of Inquiry, does not appear to see eye to eye with Khan. In the broader drug cartel infiltration scandal, it has become clear that there is distrust among Crime Intelligence officers, as well as between different policing units.
On Monday, the Madlanga Commission picked up from where it left off last week.
Evidence against embattled Crime Intelligence officer Feroz Khan, who was wounded in a shooting in Johannesburg about a week ago, was expanded on.
Khan himself was meant to start testifying at the commission last week, but he remains in hospital because of the shooting in which he was wounded in the abdomen.
‘Counter needs to be activated’
Last week, the commission heard about messages allegedly sent between Khan and a colleague of his. (This colleague’s name has not been publicly disclosed because Hassim first needs to determine whether he does indeed work as an undercover officer.)
Some of the messages referenced Thamm.
/file/attachments/orphans/ED_608572copy_272745.jpg "Senior Crime Intelligence officer Feroz Khan. (Photo: Gallo Images / OJ Koloti)")
In January 2021, she wrote about an investigation into alleged R200-million procurement fraud involving personal protective equipment (PPE) and the South African Police Service.
She focused on two police officers assigned by the national police commissioner at the time, Khehla Sitole, to investigate and suspend the country’s then Crime Intelligence boss, Peter Jacobs, over alleged PPE tender irregularities.
Thamm explained that the two assigned officers were “themselves at the centre of a Hawks and Special Investigations Unit probe into the R200-million PPE procurement fraud”.
Her news article appeared on the Daily Maverick website on 17 January 2021.
During the Madlanga Commission proceedings last week and on Monday, it emerged that on the same day that Thamm’s article was published online, a link to it was sent from Khan’s colleague to Khan, who allegedly replied that “this journalist is a good friend of Jacobs”.
Another message that Khan allegedly sent to his colleague said “and Vearey”.
In other words, Khan was suggesting that Thamm was “friends of” former Crime Intelligence boss Jacobs and Jeremy Vearey, who headed the detective services in the Western Cape before he was controversially dismissed from the police service.
Jacobs was Khan’s superior at the time.
The colleague allegedly replied to Khan: “Counter needs to be activated on this journo.”
‘Told I was being surveilled’
On Monday, the Madlanga Commission heard that Thamm’s home was burgled roughly two months after those messages, on 13 March 2021.
Thamm only became aware of the messages when they were screened and read out during the commission proceedings on Friday last week.
An affidavit by Thamm, dated this weekend, was the focus during the commission’s early proceedings on Monday.
/file/dailymaverick/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/DSC2588.jpg "\"A round of applause\", Marianne Thamm. Daily Maverick, The Gathering 2025. (Photo: David Harrison)")
Hassim read out parts of it.
The affidavit explained that as a Daily Maverick journalist, Thamm wrote “extensively about SAPS Crime Intelligence turf wars and corruption, among other matters”.
She said that in January 2021, she was tipped off “that my phone was being ‘pinged’ and that I was being surveilled”. (Pinging refers to the tracking of a cellphone via its location.)
Thamm’s affidavit mentioned an 8 March 2021 News24 report.
It said that News24 had asked the Crime Intelligence division to stop the “illegal surveillance” of one of its journalists “following a series of reports detailing ructions in the top echelons of the police”.
Home burgled, work laptop stolen
Thamm celebrated her 60th birthday on 12 March 2021, and the burglary occurred the next evening.
In her affidavit, she recalled that when she got home that evening, she discovered her home office had been “ransacked, desk drawers emptied and pulled out and my 2014 Daily Maverick Mac laptop stolen”.
A personal MacBook Pro, which she had refurbished for her older daughter and that sported a Daily Maverick sticker, was taken from a bedroom, while jewellery, including Thamm’s late mother’s wedding ring, had also been stolen.
Items, including a flat-screen television and Bluetooth speakers, had not been taken.
Thamm’s affidavit said that she reported the burglary at a local police station and an officer who arrived at her house could not determine how the burglar or burglars got in, “which was worrying”.
Her affidavit said that the following morning, two other senior police officers arrived to take a statement and found that the intruder/s entered the house “by cutting the burglar bars outside the lounge window”.
A fingerprint expert said later that the intruder/s “had worn gloves as was clear from smudges around the window frame”.
The items stolen from Thamm’s house have not been found.
More than a coincidence?
During Monday’s Madlanga Commission proceedings, Hassim explained the relevance of the affidavit, which outlined the burglary.
“You can’t conclusively show it was linked to the WhatsApp exchange [between Khan and his colleague from two months earlier], but the sequence is alarming,” she said.
“It can’t just be a coincidence in my mind.”
Hassim said the saga needed further investigation.
She also wanted to know from Khan whether he or his colleague, who messaged about Thamm, had distanced themselves from the burglary (if they had indeed known about it).
/file/attachments/orphans/AnintruderorintruderscutandbentburgalrbarstogetintoDailyMaverickjournalistMarianneThammshomeinMarch2021ItemsincludingalaptopwerestolenPhotoSupplied_523268.jpeg "An intruder or intruders cut and bent burglar bars to get into Daily Maverick journalist Marianne Thamm’s home in March 2021. Items including a laptop were stolen. (Photo Supplied)")
“What is disturbing is that on the face of it, you have a senior Crime Intelligence officer informing another member of Crime Intelligence that a journalist appears to favour particular senior police officers, one of whom happens to be General Khan’s superior,” Hassim said.
The “superior” was Jacobs in his capacity as head of Crime Intelligence at the time.
Hassim said the saga suggested a possible “willingness to use Crime Intelligence capabilities, Crime Intelligence resources […] against a journalist” whose reporting certain police officers were uncomfortable with.
If that was the case, it was “not a lawful policing objective” but was “for the investigation of a journalist whose view you don’t like”.
‘Kicking him while he’s down’
Khan’s legal representative, Muhammad Vally, told the commission on Monday that Khan was still unable to talk to him.
This meant Vally did not have instructions from Khan on how to deal with the evidence presented during the first part of Monday’s proceedings relating to Thamm and the burglary.
Vally said he still had to act in Khan’s best interests to protect his rights, and emphasised that the evidence that was submitted troubled him.
“It troubles me because we were not privy to the intended evidence; we were not privy to where the evidence was intended to be led,” Vally said.
/file/attachments/orphans/735595059_992627460434675_92132116156855161_n_179172.jpg "Crime Intelligence officer Feroz Khan was wounded in a shooting in Johannesburg at the end of June 2026. (Photo: Madlanga Commission / SAPS / Facebook)")
He placed on record his objection to the way evidence leaders were conducting the proceedings – this included the “incremental disclosure” of evidence and the leading of it “by ambush”.
Vally emphasised that Khan could not speak yet and therefore could not respond to what was being alleged or suggested against him.
“They’re kicking him while he’s down, and it troubles me significantly,” Vally said.
Responding to him, Hassim explained that the Madlanga Commission was not a trial but an investigative inquiry.
“Information comes to us when it comes to us; the investigations are ongoing,” she said.
Hassim explained that Thamm’s affidavit was obtained only on Sunday, 6 July, and apologised that Vally had been provided with a copy of it during the proceedings on Monday, not sooner. DM
What next?
More witnesses are expected to testify before the Madlanga Commission of Inquiry, which aims to wrap up its hearings by the end of July 2026. It will then complete a report on the hearings, which will be presented to President Cyril Ramaphosa.