National director of public prosecutions Shamila Batohi. (Oupa Nkosi)
National director of public prosecutions Shamila Batohi told parliament’s ad hoc committee investigating claims of criminal activity in the justice system that she could not name the prosecutor allegedly linked to criminal cartels.
“It’s not fair on the process and it’s not fair on the person concerned. It might turn out not to be true, we may not be able to verify this information, and then destroy people’s reputation and lives,” Batohi said.
“So I’d please ask the house to be understanding and not to insist that (I reveal) the name chair, with all due respect.”
She added that she had received classified information, which informed her comments in June about the infiltration of the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA).
“The reason why I made these comments at the time was that I had received confidential intelligence that there was a very concerted attempt to compromise members of the prosecuting authority, also concerted attempts to undermine and attack the national director by individuals seeking to undermine the rule of law in this country,” Batohi told MPs.
While unable to divulge her source, Batohi said, “it was not passage talk,” but rather a formal meeting with a “formal agency” that made her aware of attempts to attack the NPA.
“I received information from the National Commissioner [Fannie Masemola] and [Crime Intelligence Head] General [Dumisani] Khumalo about a particular member of the prosecutorial authority who was involved in organised criminality,” she said.
Masemola and Khumalo have testified at the parallel Madlanga commission investigating the same claims about criminal networks linked to senior police officials.
The allegations stem from KwaZulu-Natal Police Commissioner Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi’s July media briefing, where he accused suspended Police Minister Senzo Mchunu and Deputy National Commissioner for crime detection Shadrack Sibiya of colluding with criminal cartels.
On Tuesday, Batohi said she had made a formal referral to the Investigating Directorate Against Corruption (Idac) to investigate the matter. She said she met with Masemola and Khumalo to gather more evidence and urged them to pursue more cases regarding collusion with criminal syndicates.
“(The NPA) serves the people and fights crime; we cannot be criminals ourselves,” she said.
Ad hoc committee member and Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) leader Julius Malema demanded that Batohi mention the name of the implicated prosecutor.
“We want to know who captured the justice system. And if we can’t be told names and we accept that, let’s go home … if we are going to proceed like that, we are becoming toothless,” Malema said.
ActionSA legislator Dereleen James concurred, telling Batohi, “The purpose of this ad hoc committee is basically for show and tell. We want those names, and I don’t think we are gonna be okay today leaving here (without them).”
Batohi said while she did not want to be disrespectful to the committee, “it would be hugely irresponsible” to mention the name based on intelligence she had received “that may and may not be true”.
“We don’t know if it was a direct consequence of what happened in this house, but you know that our chief investigator of Idac was attacked a day or two after his name was mentioned in this house,” she added.
Batohi said the kidnapping and robbery of Idac chief of investigation and operation Matthews Sesoko last week may not be related, but mentioning names “does put people at risk”.
ANC MP Xola Nqola weighed in that the modus operandi of the ad hoc committee was that it must be given names “so that it actually assists in formulating the findings and recommendations”.
Nqola pointed out that in his testimony before the committee, Mkhwanazi had directly referred to Sibiya as “a rogue element” within the justice system, arguing that Batohi should therefore “feel comfortable to provide the necessary finer detail of the evidence she is giving before the committee”.
EFF MP Leigh-Ann Mathys said the committee could opt for a closed session, but had already been dealing with intelligence information, and the specific case Batohi mentioned would not raise eyebrows.
“On a very serious note, there are many people who have come; they’ve been cleared, they’ve cleared their names,” Mathys said.
Batohi insisted that, under policy, the NPA publicly mentions names only after a person has appeared in court.
“We do not even mention that people are the subject of investigation. Names are never mentioned by the NPA generally. Maybe the idea of a closed session is not such a bad one because it is at the level of intelligence. I think it would be hugely irresponsible of me to mention the name of a person,” she said, adding that the allegations have the potential to ruin lives.
Batohi said she could comment on whether a KwaZulu-Natal-based political killings task team that has been at the centre of Mkhwanazi’s allegations was successful, but recalled receiving a report that prosecutors did not enrol cases during former police minister Bheki Cele’s term.
“I then got a report from the KwaZulu-Natal [director of public prosecutions] about each of those cases with reasons why the cases were not enrolled. But that is the one specific instance that I recall about cases being dealt with by the [task team],” Batohi said.
“Apart from that, there’s no specific issues that came up regarding the [task team], so I cannot say whether it was successful or not.”
In her opening statement, Batoho said Mkhwanazi’s allegations represented a “critical inflexion point in terms of consolidating the rule of law and accountability”.
“This moment that we are at right now should not be squandered. We really should use this as a catalyst for comprehensive institutional reforms that are critical to safeguard the integrity as well as the effectiveness of all the law enforcement entities across the system,” she said.