Marianne Merten
The police officer charged with rooting out urban terrorists who have been planting bombs and assassinating opponents in the Western Cape for years is seeking protection from his wife.
The head of the Western Cape’s anti-urban terrorism campaign Operation Good Hope, Assistant Commissioner Ganief Daniels, is applying to court for a restraining order against his estranged wife Dawn after she assaulted him with a knife.
Daniels received five stitches under his chin after a domestic dispute got out of hand over the weekend.
The couple is divorcing and Daniels has already taken steps to ensure that he gets custody of their two children. Both are staying with him at the hotel to where he moved after he received death threats following his appointment to head Operation Good Hope.
Rumours of various marital infidelities, involving subordinates and civilians under his command, have troubled the anti-terror chief for some time. Last year his teenaged son tried to commit suicide and his secretary also attempted to take her life.
Daniels said he hoped the domestic difficulties would not interfere with his application to be appointed provincial police commissioner . He said he had informed his superiors as well as officials at South African Police Service head office in Pretoria about his marital difficulties.
Meanwhile, Operation Good Hope has been unsettled on a different front.
Representative Captain Anine de Beer has been removed from her post following alleged racist remarks about a fellow officer who she described as a “the damned Hottentot who wants to take over everything”.
De Beer has been assigned to a desk job at the police’s east metropole area offices until a departmental inquiry and criminal investigation are completed.