Mayor calls on Prasa to act on alleged gang-links to central line contracts
10 March 2026
Cape Town Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis has called on Prasa to fully investigate and root out any gang links from its central line contracts, and to ensure accountability for all involved. This follows an Amabhungane investigative report which found that alleged gang boss Ralph Stanfield appears to have used Prasa’s security chief to capture a share of the rail agency’s multi-billion-rand Cape Town central line presidential reconstruction project.
The investigative report alleges that violent disruption of the Central Line project created pressure for security solutions, after which companies linked to Ralph Stanfield and wife Nicole Johnson, positioned themselves as subcontractors within the reconstruction contracts, particularly through Mzansi Securifire, which received around R600m in central line contacts from 2022 – 2024.
‘I am calling on Prasa to suspend the implicated officials pending a full investigation, establish the total amount of contract-funding that flowed to gang-linked companies, and pursue the black-listing of those companies where applicable. We know this can be done as the City successfully ensured the national black-listing of over a dozen gang-linked companies following our own investigations.
‘The state must shut down all potential avenues of funding to gangsterism, and root out corrupt officials working with the underworld. In this way, we will cut off key funding streams to gang bosses and reduce the scope for organised crime in our city,’ said Mayor Hill-Lewis.
SAPS involvement in pushing for Stanfield-linked companies?
Even more concerning is the reported alleged involvement of a senior SAPS official in pressure to onboard gang-linked subcontractors. On 6 September 2022, Bishop Lavis’s then-acting police station commissioner allegedly emailed crime intelligence officers, Prasa executives, and a main central line contractor, inviting them to meet the next day at Manenberg Police Station to discuss security issues.
AmaBhungane reports that based on its understanding, at this meeting, Prasa’s contractor was introduced to representatives of two SMME security companies linked to Stanfield - GParm Protection Services and PPE Security and Projects - and were told that they would help resolve the security situation, along with Yibaninati (Pty) Ltd, founded by Johnson, Stanfield’s wife.
‘The implications of gang infiltration into SAPS are simply too serious to ignore. That is why I further call on the SAPS Provincial Commissioner to initiate a full investigation into the circumstances of this meeting at Manenberg Police Station, where an acting SAPS station commander is said to have actively promoted Stanfield-linked security SMMEs to a Prasa contractor. There were several people reportedly present – including Prasa officials and the contractor – who can account for the true events of that day,’ said Mayor Hill-Lewis.
All of this is in the context of Prasa’s security chief allegedly actively promoting Stanfield-linked companies, even in the face of contractor pushback, seemingly in an attempt to get Prasa’s procurement machinery to adjust the main contracts so that they could subcontract Stanfield-Johnson-linked companies as their security providers.
It is reported that contractor pushback culminated on 20 September 2022, with Prasa’s Western Cape lead programme manager emailing the central line main contractors to indicate that he had raised their concerns with Prasa CEO, Hisham Emeran, who had asked that the contractors duly inform Prasa in writing about ‘your reservations around the onboarding of the identified SMMEs and the facilitators.’
‘Mr Emeran should explain these comments, and whether he knew of these gang links or not,’ said Mayor Hill-Lewis.
Published by:
City of Cape Town, Media Office
