Salon owner Nomaxabiso Xhotyeni says Thabo Bester walked into her salon with five women as “Thomas K Bester, CEO of MTV Base”

Salon owner Nomaxabiso Xhotyeni says Thabo Bester walked into her salon with five women as “Thomas K Bester, CEO of MTV Base”.

The salon owner Nomaxabiso Xhotyeni tells Sunday Times that she remembers the day Thabo Bester walked into her Table View hair salon in Cape Town with five young women, in April 2011, pretending to be “Thomas K Bester, CEO of TV channel MTV Base”.

Nomaxabiso Xhotyeni adds that meeting Facebook rapist Thabo Bester is not a day she can easily forget as “everything about that day was so dramatic”. 

The Cape Town salon owner also tells the publication that Bester, who introduced himself as Thomas K Bester, CEO of TV channel MTV Base”, walked into her salon with five women, and tried to trick them into doing their hair without paying a cent. 

The women looked wealthy, as some carried MacBooks, which she knew were very expensive and he wanted them to do their hair as they were due for a photo shoot at 3 pm that day. 

Xhotyeni adds that  Bester was a very charming, well-spoken, and handsome guy and that everyone was drooling over him.

 The convicted murderer gave her his business card with the name Thomas K Bester on it and she kept the business card as a souvenir until she moved houses a few years ago but discarded it later. The businesswoman Nomaxabiso Xhotyeni also says she had an “uncomfortable feeling” about Thabo Bester as he disappeared and left the women at the salon for hours on end. When she called him, he said he was on his way to the airport to get some of his luggage and said he would be back soon. 

When hours went by, she told her staff to stop doing the girls’ hair as they were not sure if he was going to come back. 

When he finally showed up just before closing, he told Xhotyeni he didn’t have money to pay as his wallet was with his lost luggage.  

“This man who was initially calm and charming now looked so agitated and was pacing up and down … he even suggested that I call cops on him when I demanded payment.” 

She adds that one of the women, who came into her salon with Bester told her she had been raped by him the previous night in his hotel room.

Another girl said she also had sex with Bester as he called them to his room one by one, but they thought this was acceptable behaviour in the modelling industry.