Minister of Police must answer questions on Malema speeding report

Reports that ANC Youth League president Julius Malema attempted to sidestep being prosecuted for alleged speeding, must be investigated (see report). The Democratic Alliance (DA) will be posing questions to the Minister of Police and to the relevant MECs in the Limpopo Legislature on this matter, and we expect to see evidence that if Malema attempted to circumvent the law, he will be prosecuted.

The parliamentary questions we are submitting will interrogate the following matters:

• Whether Malema did indeed phone Pinkie Kekana (Limpopo roads MEC) and Walter Sathekge (General Manager of Traffic - Limpopo) or any other senior government official(s) for assistance following his speeding incident;
• Whether any of the officials acted in any way to assist Malema;
• Whether the police officials were requested to give written statements about their decision to pull Malema over and, if so, who made this request and on what basis; and
• Whether the matter is under investigation.

Of course the key point to this whole affair is whether or not Julius Malema was actually speeding and, if so, was he issued with a ticket. His response to the press seemed to imply that the whole story was fiction. If this is the case, presumably there was no ticket issued. It would also be difficult to understand why Malema and the ANCYL have not taken action against the newspaper that printed the story. Presumably if you are defamed in this way, you should seek to set the record straight. Unless there is some truth to the matter, in which case Malema's silence makes a lot more sense.

South Africans should be equal before the law. It appears however, that some within the governing party are using their positions to unduly influence legal systems and procedures in their favour. This is simply unacceptable. The DA will be posing parliamentary questions to get to the bottom of this. Malema must be treated just like other South Africans if he is suspected by authorities of breaking the law, and cannot be let off simply because he holds a position within the governing party.

Statement issued by Dianne Kohler Barnard, MP, Democratic Alliance shadow minister of police, November 2 2009

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