Democratic Alliance leader Tony Leon on Thursday vehemently dismissed calls that he apologise for his comments regarding recently-pardoned former Apla cadre Dumisani Ncamazana.
Instead, he demanded the department of justice apologise for the entire ”botch-up”.
”The department of justice should be apologising to the nation, having got us and having got the President into this terrible situation,” he told Sapa.
Charges against the former Azanian People’s Liberation Army cadre for the murder of East London businessman Martin Whitaker were dropped earlier on Thursday.
Whitaker was killed two weeks after Ncamazana was released from jail on a presidential pardon.
His arrest caused a political furore, with the DA at the forefront of criticism of the presidential pardons.
Earlier this year, Leon said President Thabo Mbeki was in the dock with Ncamazana.
The East London Regional Court heard on Thursday the murder and armed robbery charges against Ncamazana and fellow accused Luntu Nguye had been dropped.
Charges against the third accused, Ncamazana’s younger brother, Simnikiwe, still stand. Ncamazana will now be charged with illegal firearm possession.
The justice ministry said earlier on Thursday that the prosecutor in the case misread the police docket when Ncamazana was originally charged.
The department of justice and the Pan Africanist Congress have called on Leon to apologise for his comments on the issue.
Justice spokesman Paul Setsetse said Leon should ”retract, withdraw and publicly apologise for all his insinuations and innuendoes about the president, the minister of justice and the government as a whole.
”He’s gone out to find the accused guilty for the murder of Martin Whitaker. He’s convicted him, and it is high time that he should withdraw and apologise publicly all his utterances about the government, and the president in particular.”
Leon told Sapa that Ncamazana remained charged with illegal firearm possession of a gun that ”might or might not have been involved in this murder”.
He had always said the charges were allegations.
The department had made mistakes in the matter from the beginning, and new crimes committed by Ncamazana were still coming to light.
He was apparently convicted in 1997 for the armed robbery of a garage in Fort Beaufort.
”I just find this quite extraordinary, and I’d like the department of justice to come clean with the people of South Africa for what they have done.”
”I just think this thing has been a botch-up from beginning to end, and I don’t think Mr Ncamazana is a good candidate to be pardoned.”
The Pan African Congress should also keep quiet about the issue, as a number of their members had been pardoned for gross acts of murder and were now a danger to society. – Sapa