{"id":385353,"date":"2026-08-19T09:39:20","date_gmt":"2026-08-19T09:39:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/385353\/"},"modified":"2026-08-19T09:39:20","modified_gmt":"2026-08-19T09:39:20","slug":"actionsas-mayoral-candidate-accused-of-extorting-salaries-of-pas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/385353\/","title":{"rendered":"ActionSA\u2019s mayoral candidate accused of extorting salaries of PAs"},"content":{"rendered":"

Story audio is generated using AI<\/p>\n

ActionSA\u2019s Newcastle mayoral candidate<\/a> Zwelisha Nxumalo is facing allegations of extorti<\/a>ng salaries of his two former personal assistants (PAs). <\/p>\n

In a resignation letter written to the party\u2019s KZN leadership in August last year, his former PA, Sandile Gumbi, alleged that Nxumalo deducted 30% of his salary every month. <\/p>\n

He further claimed to have raised the matter with the ActionSA leadership before resigning, but nothing was ever done. \u201cMy experience with the party has been marred by poor leadership and lack of support for members like me,\u201d Gumbi\u2019s letter read. <\/p>\n

\u201cOne disturbing experience that led to my resignation is the abuse I suffered at the hands of Zwe Nxumalo, the chief whip of the Newcastle municipality, who employed me as his PA and deducted 30% of my salary every month. When I reported this to party leadership, I was met with indifference and inaction. It\u2019s clear the party prioritises those in positions of power over its members<\/a>.\u201d <\/p>\n

Nxumalo is alleged to have extorted about R50,000 of Gumbi\u2019s salary over five months at an average of R10,000 a month. <\/p>\n

Another former PA, Michael Ndebele, has made a similar allegation that Nxumalo asked him to pay for party events from his salary. His refusal and questions about that subsequently led to his dismissal, which he learned via other staff members. <\/p>\n

Ndebele said he was employed as Nxumalo\u2019s PA from July 2025 until February 2026. \u201cWhat is clear to me is that it has everything to do with extortion because he tried earlier in my employment to make me pay for party campaigns,\u201d he claimed. <\/p>\n

\u201cI refused to use my money for party events, so continuously there were expenses that were brought to me to pay for because the organisation doesn\u2019t cover for these. In a recent campaign, I questioned why we were buying chairs yet still hiring these out, and I later uncovered that he [Nxumalo] was hiring out his own chairs to the party and claiming an invoice for the hire.\u201d <\/p>\n

Ndebele further claimed that there was a party event where he had to buy refreshments for activists. <\/p>\n

ActionSA member Kwandile Sibiya said he was removed from a party\u2019s WhatsApp group after raising questions about the alleged extortion. \u201cI raised these concerns on the party group and was removed by the provincial secretary, claiming it was not the appropriate platform to raise such issues. What I was doing was to get transparency and accountability on the matters as enshrined in the party\u2019s vision,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Sibiya said Nxumalo has authority within the Newcastle structure and effectively holds several leadership roles, including chairperson, secretary, campaign manager and mayoral candidate, in the absence of a regional structure. <\/p>\n

\u201cNo one keeps him accountable for anything. We wrote to the national leadership last week. There is still no feedback.\u201d <\/p>\n

Nxumalo was contacted on Monday for the right of reply but at the time of going to print, he had not responded to text messages and calls left on his cellphone. <\/p>\n

Matthew George, ActionSA national director of communications and parliamentary operations, said: \u201cBoth individuals who were rightly fired for effectively acting as information peddlers for another political party while serving as principals of ActionSA, are well known for conduct contrary to the code of conduct expected of ActionSA members.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are also aware that both individuals now work in the office of the IFP mayor and have a history of engaging in disinformation campaigns. It is no surprise that these allegations have emerged only after their dismissal for sharing internal party information with another political party and are now resurfacing following the announcement of Mr Nxumalo as our Newcastle mayoral candidate.\u201d<\/p>\n

George said they would only take the allegations seriously if the people alleging this provided evidence.<\/p>\n

Sowetan<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Story audio is generated using AI ActionSA\u2019s Newcastle mayoral candidate Zwelisha Nxumalo is facing allegations of extorting salaries…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":385354,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[52],"tags":[7399,8553,2102,67922,107640,34314,131,184401],"class_list":["post-385353","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-south-africa","tag-actionsa","tag-extortion","tag-kzn","tag-mayoral-candidate","tag-newcastle","tag-personal-assistant","tag-south-africa","tag-zwelisha-stanley-nxumalo"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@africa\/117121513193185723","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/385353","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=385353"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/385353\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/385354"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=385353"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=385353"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=385353"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}