Port Elizabeth – Student activist Vusi Mahlangu, who claimed he was kidnapped and assaulted last week, is being detained following his arrest on charges of perjury and defeating the ends of justice.
Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation (Hawks) national spokesperson Major Robert Netshiunda said Mahlangu was arrested on Tuesday following his visit to the Hawks offices in the Eastern Cape.
Netshiunda said that Mahlangu’s version of events amounted to perjury.
Last week Mahlangu mysteriously went missing. At the time he was last seen while on his way to a meeting with workers at the Walter Sisulu University. Mahlangu’s friends raised the alarm after the activist failed to arrive at a meeting with WSU workers around the issue of outsourcing.
In a Whatsapp message, Mahlangu wrote that he had been kidnapped, beaten and was being held in a dark room.
News of his disappearance made headlines across the country.
On Friday afternoon, Mahlangu released a statement confirming that he was safe although injured, but he remained guarded about revealing any more details.
Mahlangu is credited with negotiating for workers at the Tshwane University of Technology (TUT), where management started a process to do away with outsourcing and improving the workers’ wages. He went to the Eastern Cape to assist university workers there.
Mahlangu is expected to appear in the Mthatha Magistrate’s Court soon.
African News Agency