Joel Mafereka

Malefetsane Joel Mafereka (5 November 1951 – 11 November 2013), also known as Joe Mafereka, was a South African politician and businessman who represented the African National Congress (ANC) in the Free State Provincial Legislature from 1994 to 2009. He served as the Free State's Member of the Executive Council (MEC) for Sports, Arts, Culture, Science and Technology from 2004 to 2005 and as MEC for Local Government and Housing from 2005 to 2009.

A former taxi-industry boss, Mafereka was charged with murder in November 2000, while he was serving as Speaker of the Free State Provincial Legislature. The charges emanated from a 1989 death which prosecutors linked to taxi violence. Mafereka was acquitted of all charges in 2002 and Premier Beatrice Marshoff appointed him to the Free State Executive Council at the beginning of the next legislative term. After failing to gain re-election to the legislature in the 2009 general election, Mafereka chaired the North West arm of the Commission on Traditional Leadership Disputes and Claims until his illness and death in 2013.

Early life and career Mafereka was born on 5 November 1951. During apartheid, he was a businessman in the minibus taxi industry of the Free State Goldfields. He was a member of the Majakathata taxi association (later merged into the Mahanu-Puso taxi association), based in Welkom, Free State. He was also active in the Thabong Civic Association, which participated in the Mass Democratic Movement of the late 1980s.

Political career He was elected to the Free State Provincial Legislature as an ANC representative in 1994 and he was elected Speaker in 1998, succeeding Motlalepule Chabaku. Mafereka was detained for four days in Pretoria before securing release on R10,000 bail.

Prosecutors said that Mafereka faced a murder charge in connection with the murder of Joseph Qesi, a taxi driver who had been found stoned to death in Jammersdrift near Wepener in October 1989.

Free State Executive Council: 2004–2009 In the week after his arrest in November 2000, Mafereka had been suspended as the Speaker of the provincial legislature and as a member of the ANC, pending the outcome of the trial. He remained in that position until April 2005, when, in a cabinet reshuffle, he replaced Benny Kotsoane as MEC for Local Government and Housing. He retained that position for the remainder of the legislative term but was not re-elected to the provincial legislature in the 2009 general election.

Later career and death In 2011, Mafereka was appointed to chair the North West arm of the Commission on Traditional Leadership Disputes and Claims. He remained in that position until his death on 11 November 2013. Aged 62, he died in hospital in Johannesburg after spending three weeks in a coma.