Nhleko and Phiyega use taxpayer money to get rid of Dramat for doing his job

Minister of Police, Nathi Nhleko, and the National Police Commissioner (NPC), Riah Phiyega, must be summoned to the Police Portfolio Committee to explain the alleged payment to recently resigned Hawks Boss, Anwa Dramat.

A source close to the matter has informed me that the payment includes a R3 million severance payment as of 31 March and R60 000 a month for life. This effectively amounts to a thinly veiled bribe valued at an estimated R27 million of public money based on payments made until the age of 80.

I will be writing today to the Chairperson of the Police Committee, François Beukman, requesting that the Minister and NPC be called to explain to Parliament why Dramat is being paid a severance at all given the fact that his resignation has been said to be wholly voluntary.

The circumstances of Dramat’s departure appear to suggest that there was no resignation and that he was retrenched and discharged instead in terms of Section 35 of the SAPS Act.

Section 35 is a controversial clause that was used by Bheki Cele to pay boosted pensions to a number of top police under criminal investigation. The clause allows for the discharge of a police member “in the interest of the service”. It cannot be rational, however, that the “resignation” of Dramat would be in the best interest of the service especially with SAPS being unable to provide a morsel of credible evidence of his wrongdoing.

One of the myriad reasons Bheki Cele was fired as the NPC was because of his abuse of these pension payouts for SAPS members under Section 35 – to the tune of R31.2 million over just two years. Many of those he gave these golden pensions to were under investigation at the time he sent them off to retirement.

Commissioner Phiyega seems to have been completely co-opted into Minister Nhleko’s Presidential Praise Choir chorus to remove Dramat from his post, by any means necessary, with no regard for the law and due process. It remains common cause that Dramat had done no wrong and that the only people breaking the law are those who forced him to resign and are now paying him to remain silent.

The South African taxpayer cannot be expected to fund the severance and pension of a SAPS member who it appears is being retrenched simply because his investigations were becoming politically uncomfortable for those in power.

Minister Nhleko and Commissioner Phiyega must account to Parliament for this proposed expenditure which is clearly an attempt to buy off Dramat and have him walk away quietly without exposing the illegality of the Police Minister’s actions.

Statement issued by Dianne Kohler Barnard, DA Shadow Minister of Police, April 23 2015