He was a \u201cno-nonsense\u201d person who often raised questions about suspected corruption in the department, the source said. \u201cHe questioned the appointment of certain companies that he thought were not qualified and that often made him unpopular.\u201d<\/p>\n
Although he did not have significant sway over the allocation of tenders, he \u201ccertainly had the ability to embarrass certain senior officials during meetings\u201d.<\/p>\n
Another colleague described Williams as a humble person who lived a simple life.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe complained about expensive school fees, so he didn\u2019t strike me as someone who lived the high life.\u201d<\/p>\n
Williams, described as a workaholic who needed little sleep, was shot while working in his study at about 2am.<\/p>\n
A close personal friend said his initial thought was that this was a robbery that had taken a tragic turn. But after arriving at the scene he felt that \u201csomething didn\u2019t make sense\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe rest of the house was not disturbed at all; the only blood was in the study. And there was no sign of a struggle,\u201d the friend said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe had five bullet wounds but 10 cartridge cases were found in the study. Why so many shots if it was just a robbery?\u201d<\/p>\n
The intruders took Williams\u2019s laptop, cellphone and a plasma TV.<\/p>\n
Trauma<\/strong><\/p>\n Williams\u2019s wife, Emelia, said the family was still too traumatised to talk about the killing. Yet a close relative said the robbers had used a crowbar to open a sliding door and gain entry to the house.<\/p>\n \u201cThey went straight to the study where they found Mark working. When the family heard gunshots they hid in the bathroom.\u201d<\/p>\n The family member was struck by the fact that the intruders had not searched the rest of the house for other valuable items. \u201cIt was as if their mission was to shoot Mark and take the laptop. They seem to have taken the TV to make it look like a robbery.\u201d<\/p>\n Deepening suspicions of an ulterior motive was the fact that Williams\u2019s computer bag was found on the kitchen counter with documents it had contained strewn across the floor.<\/p>\n \u201cThese people are looking for something and we don\u2019t know what it is. As a result the family had to go into hiding,\u201d said the source.<\/p>\n Emelia and Williams\u2019s two adult children, who were in the house at the time of the murder, have moved to an undisclosed address in Pretoria.<\/p>\n Since the house was vacated, there had been two further break-ins, the source said.<\/p>\n \u201cI am no crime expert, but it was very bold for the robbers to come back and steal all the laptops. The next time they took all Mark\u2019s suits and shoes and jewellery.\u201d<\/p>\n Nervouseness<\/strong><\/p>\n The water affairs department source said the apparent lack of progress in solving the case had fuelled the fears of Williams\u2019s colleagues.<\/p>\n \u201cThe investigating officers were changed four times before the case was taken over by the Hawks,\u201d claimed the source.<\/p>\n There was particular nervousness among those who had been close to the slain chief director.<\/p>\n Sources independently recalled incidents where Williams had spoken out on allegedly questionable dealings in the department.<\/p>\n \u201cYou don\u2019t know who to talk to; even if you see something is wrong you keep your mouth shut \u2026 We honestly believe that Mark\u2019s boldness got him into trouble.\u201d<\/p>\n Unlike other senior officials, Williams could afford to speak up because \u201che was good at his job. Getting rid of him would have been hard.\u201d<\/p>\n * Got a tip-off for us about this story? Click here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n Hawks investigators have taken over the case, initially thought to be just a robbery gone wrong<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":22938,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4204","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-stories"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4204","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4204"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4204\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30844,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4204\/revisions\/30844"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22938"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![](\"https:\/\/amabhungane.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/94x94.jpg\")
<\/a>The M&G<\/em> Centre for Investigative Journalism (amaBhungane) produced this story. All views are ours. See www.amabhungane.co.za <\/a> for our stories, activities and funding sources.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"