Zenzile Khoisan
New evidence has emerged of how the national head of violent crimes, Commissioner Leonard Knipe, used his senior position in the police to intimidate witnesses and threatened to topple the African National Congress government.
According to tape recordings in the possession of the Mail & Guardian, Knipe threatened to “bring down” the ANC government if it continued with a covert operation aimed at exposing senior civil servants and senior policemen connected to Mafia boss Vito Palazzolo.
Knipe had been referring to Operation Intrigue, a covert operation by the controversial presidential investigation task unit, established by former president Nelson Mandela. Knipe, who was formerly the Cape’s director of serious violent crimes, was appointed by former police commissioner George Fivaz to investigate the unit following complaints by other old-guard policemen.
The original terms of reference of the unit had been to investigate members of the Cape underworld, collusion and corruption involving government officials and high-ranking cops connected with narcotics and money-laundering syndicates.
Among the officers probed by the unit was Assistant Commissioner Neels Venter, at that time a senior official in the office of the national commissioner of police.
The tape in the possession of the M&G was covertly recorded by former unit member Detective Inspector Abraham Smith, who has been testifying during the trial of the unit’s director, Andre Lincoln.
Lincoln faces charges of fraud and corruption.
While in the service of the unit, Lincoln reported directly to former safety and security minister Sydney Mufamadi.
Under cross-examination by advocate Donald Jacobs in May, Smith admitted to making the recording in order to protect himself against Knipe.
On the tape Knipe says: “I’ll bring down the government. I’ll get every chap to resign, as ‘n ou weer na my kom met a koeverte operasie [… if another guy comes to me with a covert operation].”
Knipe is the senior investigator in the case against Lincoln, whom the state alleges abused government vehicles and conducted operations outside the normal mandate, regulations and chain of command of the South African Police Service (SAPS).
On several occasions during this marathon trial Knipe has been asked to leave the court because of allegations that he intimidated witnesses.
Last week the court convened a “trial within a trial” to decide whether the hardened apartheid-era detective should be barred from the trial.
Senior SAPS officers have testified that Knipe had abused his powerful position in the police to intimidate unit members into making statements against Lincoln.
The court has heard evidence from Detective Inspector Piet Viljoen that “Knipe has intimidated many witnesses, especially members of the presidential investigation task unit, into making statements against Andre Lincoln and turned members of the unit against him.”
He informed the court that the commissioner had given the impression that Lincoln was a corrupt individual “who had made millions”.
Under cross-examination in June Knipe admitted that professional jealousy and backbiting were factors leading to the investigation into Lincoln and the eventual disbanding of the unit .
He has also conceded that the unit’s irregular reporting channels, to the highest levels of the new government, had irritated old-guard securocrats.
A cursory review of the tape in the M&G’s possession reveals that in bad-mouthing senior black officers within the SAPS Knipe violated long-standing police protocol and etiquette.
While badgering Smith to provide details on the unit’s covert operations against the kingpins of the criminal underworld, he distinctly tells the junior officers that his commanders are not worthy of the ranks they assumed at integration and that they “should have become field workers, and learned how to do real police work”.
The court also heard evidence that this internecine strife between the decoupled unit and the regular SAPS chain of command gave rise to professional dishonesty.
Asked to comment, Knipe said: “I’m not speaking to the press, you can go ahead and write what you like.”