ActionSA’s Ekurhuleni mayoral candidate and councillor Xolani Khumalo was granted R2,000 bail on Monday after appearing at the Palm Ridge Magistrate’s Court on charges of assault with intent to cause grievous bodily harm and pointing a firearm.
The case has been postponed, with Khumalo expected to return to court in February.
Khumalo handed himself over to the South African Police Service (SAPS) at the Katlehong Police Station on Monday, January 19, 202,6 in connection with an assault charge laid against him last year.
The charges come amid his ongoing activism against alleged criminal activity in Ekurhuleni.
Khumalo is also a well-known public figure through his involvement in television programmes like Sizok’thola focused on crime and community safety, where he has built a national profile for confronting alleged drug dealers and exposing criminal syndicates.
ActionSA national chairperson Michael Beaumont said the allegations were linked to Khumalo’s previous work confronting a suspected drug dealer.
“This is the pattern that South Africans are familiar with. Criminals get let free, and those who fight criminals get harassed by the police, who are often involved in these issues.”
Beaumont said the individual in question had been arrested in 2025 for possession of illegal, unlicensed ammunition, but was released by the Katlehong police station, with the ammunition returned.
He said the same person later laid what Beaumont described as a false assault charge against Khumalo, which the police acted upon.
He framed Khumalo’s arrest as part of a broader failure in South Africa’s justice system. “Xolani Khumalo is being arrested today because he refuses to surrender the country he loves to criminals.
”He is paying the price that comes with doing the work SAPS and the judiciary either can’t or won’t do. Instead of keeping criminals off the streets and behind bars, they arrest those who do their work they are too corrupt to do,” Beaumont said.
Beaumont also highlighted the broader context of crime in the country. “In South Africa, we’ve come to accept this type of injustice as normal. We’ve come to accept it as normal that more than 65 people are murdered in cold blood each day.
”We’ve come to accept that South Africa is the rape capital of the world. We’ve come to accept the normalcy of drugs flooding our streets and taking the lives and livelihoods of desperate South Africans and their families,” he said.
He accused SAPS of failing communities. “It is an open secret that our police force is soft on criminals because it is filled with criminals itself. But at a community level, across South Africa, communities know where the drug dealers operate and when they report this to the police – they are the ones that get harassed,” Beaumont said.
According to Beaumont, Khumalo had acted where authorities did not. “Xolani raided the residence of a suspected drug dealer with SAPS. The police found unlicensed ammunition and arrested the suspect.
The suspect was never charged and never appeared in court. Instead, he was released from custody and his ammunition was returned, he said.
”We now believe the suspect is allegedly involved in a drug dealing racket with SAPS members. Now that we have the facts, we must ask why SAPS would choose to arrest Xolani whilst the drug dealer walks free? It is an uncomfortable truth that we’ve all come to accept,” he said.
Beaumont warned that corrupt police members were acting against Khumalo because of his activism.
“Corrupt police members have seen Xolani do the job of restoring law and order, and now, they’re scared of him coming after them. Because they know Xolani will stop at nothing to hold them accountable for failing the South African people.
”This is why they will do everything in their power to stop him. Patriots, we cannot let them put an end to Xolani’s work,” he said.
ActionSA said it would continue monitoring the case and holding SAPS accountable.
“We call on every South African patriot who is gatvol of police corruption, collusion, and inaction to stand in solidarity with Xolani today.
”He has fought for you to keep drug lords and drug dealers off of the streets, and so we call on South Africans to now fight for him. Xolani, we as ActionSA and as South Africans who love their country stand in solidarity with you.”
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