AKA‘s manager told a Durban court Tuesday that Anwar Khan had assigned another bodyguard to protect the rapper on the day he was killed because Khan was unavailable.

The manager said he had arranged security for AKA’s planned stay in the city and communicated with Khan, who owned Pentagon, the security company the team used in Durban. A colleague took the February 10, 2023 assignment, Eyewitness News reported.

That account brought the arrangements for the rapper’s protection into a trial over the killings of AKA, born Kiernan Forbes, and his friend Tebello “Tibz” Motsoane. Both men were shot outside Wish restaurant on Florida Road.

Questions about the night’s security had surfaced soon after the shooting. In a March 2023 interview with Annika Larsen, Khan said he would have limited the rapper’s travel to the airport, hotel and show, keeping extra stops off the schedule.

“In my absence, protocol was breached. Kiernan was called and invited to go to Florida Road’s Wish restaurant, which he accepted,” Khan said, in comments previously covered by AllHipHop.

He said the road manager should have handled the invitation. His comments described the precautions he believed should have been followed; the current case concerns the seven men accused of planning and carrying out the killings.

Police later alleged that the attackers had tracked AKA’s movements well before the shooting. At a February 2024 briefing, KwaZulu-Natal police commissioner Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi said a spotter followed him from the airport to his hotel and then the restaurant.

Investigators described an operation involving two shooters, two spotters, a person who supplied weapons and getaway vehicles and a coordinator who organized the team and payments. Police publicly outlined those allegations more than a year after the shooting.

Earlier Tuesday, a club promoter who had collected AKA and his entourage from the airport described the shooting’s aftermath.

He told the court he saw Forbes on the ground and Motsoane wounded as people tried to get help.

All seven defendants pleaded not guilty when the trial opened on October 5.

They face charges including conspiracy to commit murder, two counts of murder, attempted murder and firearm offenses. The National Prosecuting Authority previously listed November 6 as the end of this trial block.