Rasool is paranoid — Zille

A politically motivated police service and an unconstitutional commission of inquiry worked together to deliver to a ‘paranoid” Ebrahim Rasool evidence that they hoped would taint her, DA leader and Cape Town mayor Helen Zille has told the Cape High Court.

‘[The premier’s] appointment of a commission of inquiry is not intended to obtain information to enable him to make decisions or furnish the city with advice — [There are numerous] indications that the premier has already arrived at unfounded conclusions which he seeks to use to purely political advantage,” she said in an affidavit filed this week. It forms part of the city’s application to halt the commission of inquiry under Judge Nathan Erasmus.

The Erasmus commission was established by Rasool in December last year to look into the City of Cape Town’s use of private investigators to probe allegations of bribery and intimidation against the underworld-linked National People’s Party councillor, Badih Chaaban. The city’s investigations took place while Chaaban was attempting to bring down the ruling DA coalition during the September 2007 floor-crossing period.

In her affidavit Zille attacks the legal underpinnings of the commission, saying it is not supported by the relevant legislation.

But at the heart of her affidavit are allegations that Rasool, South African Police Service (SAPS) provincial commissioner Mzwandile Petros, the provincial organised crime unit of the SAPS and Erasmus commission secretary Zithulele Twala improperly collaborated in a series of overlapping investigations designed to damage the DA, while ignoring clear evidence that Chaaban was guilty of misconduct.

The allegations form part of Zille’s rebuttal of claims made by Rasool in his own affidavit last week. Rasool relied heavily on an interim report by the Erasmus commission’s evidence leader, Frans Petersen. Contrary to what Rasool and the police had suspected, the commission could find no evidence that George Fivaz and Associates or investigator Phillip du Toit had carried out illegal surveillance.

However, the interim report stitches together a range of circumstantial evidence, including excerpts from the cellphone records of Zille and other DA leaders, which Rasool cites as proof that she played a role in directing the Chaaban investigation.

The interim document also describes testimony by Kent Morkel, a former DA provincial chair who has since joined the ANC, that the investigation was commissioned for political purposes ‘to prevent Chabaan from toppling the coalition” rather than to deal with improper conduct.

Zille sets out a different version of events in her affidavit. Almost all the documents and voice recordings handed in as evidence to the commission, she points out, were obtained in police raids on the homes of Du Toit, who carried out the bulk of the investigation into Chaaban, and of Niel van Heerden, the George Fivaz and Associates’ partner who subcontracted him.

Before his September 20 arrest on charges of hijacking and possession of stolen property Du Toit did undercover investigations for the National Intelligence Agency and the Scorpions into drug and abalone syndicates. He also reported on police corruption in the Cape.

That placed him at the centre of a turf war between the provincial organised crime unit and the Scorpions — an aspect Zille does not deal with in her affidavit.

But she does make it clear she believes his arrest was not the ‘coincidence” Rasool and Petros claimed. A week after Du Toit’s arrest his apartment was searched. But Zille says the warrant used alleged Du Toit was involved in illegal surveillance, not hijacking.

And provincial prosecutors and the organised crime unit have told Du Toit’s legal team that they cannot go ahead with the hijacking case until the Erasmus commission has wrapped up.

Zille also lays into Petros and Rasool over the sharing of evidence seized from Du Toit.

‘If SAPS were in fact involved in a bona fide criminal investigation concerning Du Toit, it is not apparent to me (nor does the premier explain) why any police official, let alone someone as highly placed as Commissioner Petros, should have disclosed evidence to the premier — the disclosure to third parties of private documents seized by SAPS from a suspect is unlawful,” the affidavit says.

Zille attacks the December 19 raid on Van Heerden’s home. She questions apparently improper coordination between the Erasmus commission and the SAPS and casts doubt on the impartiality of Superintendent Piet Viljoen of the organised crime unit, who is leading the criminal investigation.

‘Viljoen — who was present during the search at Van Heerden’s home, was in telephonic contact with the Erasmus commission’s secretary, Mr Twala, during the search. Van Heerden confirms that the police took instructions from Twala as to what material to seize during the raid on his house,” Zille says.

Other comments made by police officers in the course of the investigation provide her with ammunition.

While she was being interrogated by Viljoen, Zille says, he ‘professed to have no love for the DA and boasted of the damage he had supposedly done to the DA’s reputation in the Desai commission’s investigation [into donations made by German fraudster Jurgen Harksen]”.

And ‘Superintendent Renier du Preez acknowledged in [the] presence of [Du Toit’s counsel] that the organised crime unit had ‘worked through many nights’ to compile documents for the Erasmus commission.”

Zille reports that Du Preez also confirmed to Du Toit’s counsel that Twala instructed the organised crime unit to take documents from Van Heerden’s home.

He expressed unease at ‘getting involved in politics” but said he was ‘just doing as instructed”.

‘The only inference to be drawn is that the relationship between the Western Cape provincial government and senior police officials in the Western Cape is such that the former is able to call on the latter’s assistance for political purposes,” Zille concludes.

The case is set down for a hearing on Thursday next week.