Politically motivated Booysen appeal should signal return of the Scorpions

19 November 2015

It is clear as day that the independence of the Hawks is compromised and should be replaced by the Scorpions. Further evidence of this fact emerged as Hawks boss Berning Ntlemeza, chose to continue the witch-hunt against exonerated KZN Hawks boss, Major General Johan Booysen, and appeal the decision to overturn his suspension. This will be the sixth such appeal and represents the height in frivolous litigation at the expense of the taxpayer. 

Just yesterday the Durban High Court overturned Booysen's suspension. Not only did Judge Van Zyl rule that national Hawks boss Berning Ntlemeza, did not have a case against Booysen, whom he accused of committing fraud, but that “there [was] not even prima facie evidence that such fraud had been committed, or if it had that the applicant is implicated therein.” 

Judge Van Zyl also ordered that Ntlemeza be barred from suspending Booysen again pending the outcome of the current disciplinary process.

It must be noted that Ntlemeza is illegitimately appointed as Hawks head in the first place and, as determined by the Constitutional Court, has no credibility to suspend anyone. He was clearly appointed to settle a political score.

In so doing the litigation against Booysen is nothing but a witch-hunt and was instituted because Booysen dared charge President Zuma’s son’s business partner, Thoshan Panday.  

It is disturbing that this sort of frivolous litigation, at taxpayers' expense, has come to characterise all our corruption-busting institutions.

The DA will submit Parliamentary questions to ascertain just how much this frivolous litigation has cost the South African taxpayers.

The DA have long held that the Hawks' effectiveness in fighting corruption has been compromised by political interference. In October, a reply to a DA parliamentary question further confirmed this. 

The reply revealed that since the disbandment of the Scorpions in January 2009, there has been a 60% decline in arrests and an astounding 83% plummet in conviction rates in the last six years of the Hawks’ existence. 

This is clear evidence that the disbandment of the Scorpions was fatally flawed in the first place because it allowed for pervasive undue political influence.

The DA has called for the Hawks to be disbanded and the Scorpions reinstated to its rightful place in a strong and independent National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) as the key corruption-busting unit in our country. The NPA itself must be independent and free from political interference, to ensure that meaningful strides in the fight against corruption are made and that a credible head is appointed whose priority is to discharge his or her mandate without fear or favour. 

Our country is rife with corruption and it cannot be that the body established to combat this is compromised by political interference, as it has been. The DA will continue to fight for an independent and effective corruption-fighting Scorpions.

Issued by Zakhele Mbhele, DA Shadow Minister of Police, 19 November 2015