By Jenni Evans
Free State premier Beatrice Marshoff said on Wednesday that she was shocked by the murder of Noby Ngombane, a top official in her office.
"No-one knows why it should happen to him," Marshoff said through tears before breaking off the conversation, unable to continue.
Ngombane, 38, was shot dead at his house in Bloemfontein on Tuesday night.
Police spokesperson Inspector Harry Nagel said a car pulled into the driveway of his house in Hillsboro at around 10pm.
He went outside to investigate and the occupants of the vehicle opened fire on him.
He ran back to the house while they were shooting at him but he collapsed in the kitchen and later died in the Hydromed hospital as a result of his wounds.
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"A political motive for the murder was a possibility but we cannot confirm it," Nagel said.
Ngombane was the head of the Free State government's policy-monitoring and evaluation unit in the premier's office.
He was also the premier's and the provincial government spokesperson, was a close confidante of the premier and a former official of the ANC in the Free State.
But since being appointed as head of the department of tourism, environmental and economic affairs in former premier Winky Direko's government, Ngombane had been embroiled in controversy.
A KPMG audit report commissioned in 2003 by Ngombane, while Ngombane was still head of the department, noted a breakdown in the relationship between Ngombane and previous tourism MEC, Sakhiwo Belot.
The report said this was exposing the department to financial risk and that one or both of them be replaced. The main reasons for this appeared to be a "lack of financial delegations".
Ngombane told a committee on public spending that "we had an disagreement on my role as department head in terms of the Public Service Act and his powers as MEC of the department".
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