March and March leaders linked to millions in government contracts – From protest marches to public contracts: the government money trail surrounding Jacinta and Xolani Zuma’s businesses

March and March leader Jacinta Ngobese-Zuma and her husband, Xolani Zuma, have received government contracts worth almost R12 million since 2021, according to procurement data and government expenditure records.

The contracts include provincial and national work, with most of the reported business linked to the KwaZulu-Natal government. The revelations have raised questions about the couple’s dealings with the state at a time when March and March has been leading public campaigns demanding that the government expel undocumented migrants from South Africa and enforce immigration laws more aggressively.

The group’s protests and campaigns have gained national attention, particularly after anti-immigration demonstrations in Durban and Soweto turned violent. The unrest followed widespread disinformation about a Constitutional Court judgment concerning the administrative processing of asylum seekers.

Ngobese-Zuma and Zuma have close ties to political figures in KwaZulu-Natal. Their companies include XJ Family Enterprise, which is directed by both of them, and Zuma and Partners Incorporated, the law firm of which Xolani Zuma is the sole director.

[do_widget id=super_rss_reader-3] –> –> Ngobese-Zuma leads March and March, while her husband is the chief executive of its spin-off organisation, SA First Forum, and serves as the legal head of both organisations.

The largest contract identified in the available records is a three-year agreement awarded to XJ Family Enterprise by the KwaZulu-Natal Department of Agriculture and Rural Development for “farmer support and development”.

According to the province’s capital-expenditure projection for the 2026/27 financial year, the contract was worth R10.5 million over three years. The allocation for the 2026/27 financial year was R3.5 million.

XJ Family Enterprise was registered in September 2024, less than a year before the farmer-support tender was advertised in June 2025. Company records show that Ngobese-Zuma and Xolani Zuma are its only directors.

It was not clear from the available information what agricultural expertise the company or its directors had. Xolani Zuma did purchase a farm in KwaZulu-Natal for R2 million in 2022. Deeds-office records show that the property was secured by a R1.7 million bond with Absa Home Loans.

KwaZulu-Natal Agriculture and Rural Development spokesperson Vusi Khumalo acknowledged questions about the contract and the selection criteria for the farmer-support programme. The questions included why the couple had been selected when neither was known to be active in the agricultural industry.

No response had been provided at the time of publication.

The department’s failure to respond does not establish that the contract was improperly awarded. However, the absence of information about the tender process leaves questions about the evaluation criteria, the company’s capacity and the services it was expected to provide.

Legal-services payments and events contracts

Procurement records also show that Zuma and Partners Incorporated received payments for legal services from the KwaZulu-Natal Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs.

The payments were made across seven transactions between the 2024/25 financial year and the current 2026/27 reporting period. Most of the transactions took place during the 2025/26 financial year and totalled slightly more than R1 million.

Ngobese-Zuma’s events company, Sodelwa Trading, was paid R118,000 by the provincial Department of Sport and Recreation for an advertising contract during the 2021/22 financial year.

Sodelwa Trading also received R20,000 from the national Department of Sports, Arts and Culture during the 2020/21 financial year as part of Covid-19 relief funding, according to the department’s support report.

The company has also done business with municipalities, including an events-management contract with Msunduzi Municipality, which includes Pietermaritzburg.

The reported contracts do not by themselves prove wrongdoing. Government departments regularly contract private companies for services through procurement processes. The central questions are whether the companies met the relevant requirements, whether the contracts were properly awarded and whether the services were delivered.

Ngobese-Zuma declined to answer detailed questions about her companies’ dealings with the state. She responded: “I hope you can prove this, or we will sue you until you walk in underwear. Write your story.”

Xolani Zuma said he did not want to comment before publication but would be willing to take part in an interview afterwards to explain the nature of his business with government.

After written questions were sent to Ngobese-Zuma, she published the correspondence on social media. The correspondence included the reporter’s personal contact details, after which the journalist received a series of threats, including death threats.

Ngobese-Zuma was served with a letter of demand. Although she later removed the contact details, she reportedly refused to apologise or ask supporters to stop threatening members of the media. Further legal action was being considered.

Ngobese-Zuma’s rise as a social-media figure reportedly began around 2008 or 2009, when she administered a Facebook group that rated the appearances of students at Durban tertiary institutions.

The group, called “031’s Hottest”, was described by one former associate as the “Durban FHM”, a reference to the lifestyle magazine known for its annual list of the world’s most attractive women. The “031” referred to Durban’s telephone area code and the surrounding areas.

“Every Friday, the group would have the ‘who’s hot and who’s not’ challenge. If we all played our cards right, the group would probably have made us all a lot of money,” one former associate joked.

Her radio career later helped expand her audience. She streamed broadcasts to her Facebook followers, allowing her on-air personality to reach people beyond the station’s traditional audience.

One associate said: “So, that was one of the first components of how she created this cult following. Jacinta really did cool shit on the radio and stayed engaged with her audience, who, in turn, stayed engaged with her,” the source added.

Ngobese-Zuma has been a director of African Global Networks, a non-profit company, since September 2019. The organisation regularly hosts events and summits in collaboration with government departments, including the Department of Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities.

In August, the organisation hosted a Status of Women summit addressed by Ngobese-Zuma. The event received support from UN Women South Africa, the African Union Development Agency and the South African government.

Ngobese-Zuma is also a close friend of Thembinkosi Ngcobo, the former head of eThekwini Municipality’s parks, recreation and culture department. Ngcobo previously served as an ANC branch leader in eThekwini’s ward 35 and is now a prominent MK Party leader in KwaZulu-Natal.

Ngcobo left the ANC after being dismissed from the municipality in June 2021. His dismissal followed a South African Local Government Bargaining Council finding that he was guilty of misconduct for failing to report a “fraudulent” R140,000 municipal payment in 2015.

In July last year, after Ngobese-Zuma was dismissed as a mid-morning presenter at a radio station, Ngcobo posted a photograph with her and said she had personally informed him of her dismissal.

“[It] would seem that our former liberators are investing substantial amounts of public resources to spread certain messages to the public using various publicity platforms – including Vuma FM – Jacinta’s employers,” Ngcobo alleged.

Xolani Zuma also has a political background. He was a student leader of the ANC-aligned South African Students Congress and served on the University of Zululand’s student representative council from 2005 to 2007, including as SRC president in 2006/07.

During his time as SRC president, he faced charges of bringing the university into disrepute after allegedly leading an “illegal strike”. Sasco said at the time that the university was offering unregistered degrees.

The couple’s 2024 wedding was attended by former KwaZulu-Natal premier Nomusa Dube-Ncube, who previously held several provincial portfolios.

The procurement questions now sit alongside March and March’s increasingly visible anti-immigration activism. The couple’s political messaging challenges the government’s immigration policies, while their companies continue to receive work from government institutions.

Whether those contracts were properly awarded and whether all services were delivered remains a matter for the relevant departments and oversight bodies to clarify.

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