The man who leaked disturbing footage of five men being tortured by Zanzou nightclub’s bouncers seemingly returned with more chilling and eerie footage on a new X account on Wednesday.
Earlier this week, the man, known as Pablo, took to social media to leak footage of five men who were tied up, assaulted and forced to commit sexual acts on themselves by bouncers of the nightclub in Pretoria in January 2023.
While Zanzou said they had fired the bouncers since the incident and would co-operate with police, Pablo went onto TikTok to announce that he would be posting more videos.
He said earlier this week that about 75 videos of similar incidents would be leaked, as he worked for the club’s owner for seven years.
On Thursday, a new X account, @BIGPforpablo, started sharing a series of videos of men being beaten or getting undressed.
In one unsettling video, a naked man is seen lying on the concrete floor of a store room, with his ankle tied by one man while another man is hitting him with a belt. The man is heard screaming while repeatedly saying “sorry”.
One of the most eerie videos was that of a topless man wearing jeans lying on his back with his eyes closed with a man’s boot on his face. It is not clear if the man is alive.
Police spokesperson Brig Athlenda Mathe told TimesLIVE that they knew about the X account and the videos.
“Intelligence is trying to trace him and everyone else who is involved. We are actively searching for the culprits,” she said.
Social media immediately linked the video of the seemingly unconscious man to Kulani Shirinda, who had disappeared in August 2023.
His sister, Amukelani Shirinda, told TimesLIVE that she was receiving calls and texts from people claiming that her missing brother was in the videos.
But it was not him, she said.
“What is happening is very disturbing and traumatic for me and, especially, my mother. People are insisting it is him but it is not. The missing post has been shared on social media and I just want it to stop and for people to stop calling us. We still have not found my brother,” she said.
She said Shirinda was last seen in Hillbrow after a night out with four friends. The group was apparently headed to the Maboneng district and Shirinda requested an Uber to take him back to his student accommodation.
However, two minutes before the Uber arrived, Shirinda apparently cancelled the request.
“According to his friends, a white bakkie then stopped and he got into it. He was never seen again. When we looked at the footage, we could see that he had been drinking and police noticed that the number plate was not registered to the bakkie but to a Mercedes-Benz. We still don’t know where he is.”
She said this was not the first time she had received calls about the whereabouts of her brother as the family was often contacted by his supposed kidnappers, demanding money.
“We received so many calls after he went missing from scammers claiming to be him and wanting money, or claiming they know where he is and want us to pay them.
“We have tried everything to find him but nothing is coming forward. People are saying the videos are of my brother are disturbing — but it's not true. The person in the video does not look like Kulani,” she said.
TimesLIVE
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