President Thabo Mbeki never ordered suspended prosecutions boss Vusi Pikoli to stop the prosecution of police National Commissioner Jackie Selebi, Pikoli told the Ginwala inquiry into his fitness to hold office on Friday.
”The president never said to me that I must stop the prosecution of Mr Selebi,” he said in Johannesburg.
However, Pikoli said the events and activities at the time of his suspension as national director of public prosecutions support his belief that the Selebi prosecution was the real reason for his suspension.
”You cannot dispute the attempted concealment of executive interference into this matter immediately prior to my suspension, which is not consistent with all the interaction I have had,” he said.
He informed Mbeki that he had secured warrants against Selebi on September 11 2007 after a long period of interaction about the Selebi investigation, and then telling Mbeki Selebi had been added as a suspect.
Pikoli said that although none of the correspondence between himself, Minister of Justice and Constitutional Development Brigitte Mabandla and Mbeki mentioned the word ”arrest”, it was clear that this was where the investigation into the police chief might go.
”The DSO [Directorate of Special Operations] does not investigate for the sake of investigating. It boggles the mind to think that this was just an exercise that would go nowhere,” he said of the accusation that he had never informed Mbeki of his intention to arrest Selebi.
In response to an accusation that he only ever referred to search warrants and obtaining ”relief” from the courts, and never used the word ”arrest”, he said the minister and the president had always understood that.
”The president and the minister were under no illusion that the national commissioner might be, might be, might be, prosecuted,” he said.
The state argues that Pikoli should have informed Mbeki so that he could create an ”enabling” environment for Selebi’s arrest.
Pikoli said that after the warrants were obtained he had ordered that they not be executed until he gave the go-ahead. Following this he went to inform Mbeki.
When he arrived at Mbeki’s office with the warrants in a black bag to tell him about them, Mbeki was shocked and said he would need two weeks to create this ”enabling” environment.
Pikoli said that this would be too long given the potential for leaks. As it was, a few days after that meeting he was told by former DSO head Leonard McCarthy that police Commissioner Andre Pruis had phoned to ask him about them.
”There’s always that risk that this might leak, that’s why I was uncomfortable with two weeks.”
However, state advocate Kgomotso Moroka denied that the conversation about needing two weeks ever took place, saying this was based on evidence from Director General in the Presidency Frank Chikane. Pikoli said he stood by what he said.
A week after telling Mbeki about the warrants, he was suspended.
Pikoli maintains that the National Prosecuting Authority is an independent body and does not need permission from the executive to carry out its duties. — Sapa