Police investigate ambassador’s Porsche fire

Mpumalanga police have opened an inquiry to find the cause of the fire in which the property of South Africa’s consul-general to China, Lassy Chiwayo, was destroyed.

Provincial police spokesperson Colonel Leonard Hlathi said Chiwayo’s Porsche and a quadbike were damaged at a state house in Thekwane South outside Nelspruit.

“The house itself did not catch fire. It is an inquiry for now,” Hlathi said.

Chiwayo said he had left his belongings there for safe-keeping. He has been in the country working from the department of international relations and co-operation in Pretoria over the past few weeks.

Chiwayo said he has flown to Nelspruit.

He used the house while he was Mbombela executive mayor before being posted to Shanghai, China, last year. Former ANC treasurer-general Mathews Phosa also stayed in the house when he was premier of Mpumalanga province in the late 90s.

Chiwayo said earlier today he suspected his political rivals could be behind this incident.

Last year February his house at Ridgehill Estate in Drumrock near White River was also broken into and four pairs of shoes were taken.

When he was Mbombela mayor, Chiwayo was seeking justice for the murder of the municipality’s former speaker, Jimmy Mohlala.

Mohlala was assassinated while fighting tender corruption in the R1.2-billion Mbombela World Cup soccer stadium.

His outspokenness on the matter forced him to beef up his security because he suspected that there was a plot to assassinate him as well.