HOME Affairs has confirmed that murderer and rapist Thabo Bester was born on 13 June 1986 at Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital in Soweto, but his birth was never registered.
Minister Aaron Motsoaledi briefed the media on Friday, 14 April on the latest developments in the case of Bester and Dr Nandipha Magudumana.
The minister said Bester’s birth was not registered in their system because his mother only got her ID in 2002, when she was 37 years old.
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He said that when she got her ID, Bester had disappeared and he was 16 years old at the time.
Motsoaledi said that the investigation revealed that Bester left school in grade 5, adding that four or five years later his mother never saw him again and that was also the time his gogo died.
He said when Bester was arrested again in Tanzania, it turned out that he had an American passport with the name Tom William Kelly.
“Bester never applied for any passport or ID in South Africa. We still need to confirm with the Americans if the passport is legit or not.
“It was like when he was 16 someone told him not go near Home Affairs. The only time he got into the system was when he was first arrested and got into the prison system because he had to present his fingerprints,” said Motsoaledi.
The minister said that when Dr Nandipha was arrested in Tanzania, she was actually caught with three passports, one of which belonged to her and the other two passports belonged to Dr Patience Ntshani, also known as as Dr Pashy.
Motsoaledi said that the two passports, one which expired in 2022 and the other one was still valid until 2029, were issued in 2019, before the first passport expired.
The minister said the passports were not used, so there was no evidence that Dr Nandipha assumed the identity of Dr Pashy.
He said he still does not understand why she had the passports, or if perhaps she still planned to use them before her arrest.
Regarding the couple's movement when they fled Mzansi recently, Motsoaledi said he did not know how or when this happened because there was nothing in their database.
“The police will have to investigate that,” said Motsoaledi.
