Pretoria – The Pretoria Magistrate’s Court has authorised a warrant for the arrest of the former head of Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation (Hawks), Anwa Dramat, who missed his court appearance on Friday.
Dramat, together with his co-accused, suspended Gauteng Hawks boss, Major General Shadrack Sibiya and Hawks Colonel, Lesley Maluleke, were supposed to appear before Magistrate Lydia Painter on four counts of kidnapping, two counts of defeating the ends of justice and one count of contravention of the Immigration Act.
Read: Renditions: Another Ipid disciplinary case looms
However, Dramat did not show up and the magistrate ordered that a warrant for Dramat’s arrest be authorised but held over until the next court date where he would be expected to make representations as to why he did attend court.
The matter was postponed to September 30, for co-accused Sibiya and Maluleke to receive responses on their applications for legal financial assistance from the Minister of Police. A similar request by Dramat had previously been granted.
Defence lawyer, Victor Nkhwashu, who is standing in for all the three accused’s legal representatives, said the reason Dramat could not make it to court was to avoid fruitless expenditure by travelling to Gauteng from Cape Town where he stays for a short postponement.
Nkhwashu appealed to police minister Nathi Nhleko to expedite Sibiya and Maluleke’s financial assistance applications so that the matter could be heard as soon as possible.
It is alleged that Dramat and his co-accused were involved in the arrest of Zimbabwean immigrants and subsequent illegal rendition of four of them to that country in late 2010 and early 2011.
Prosecutor George Baloyi asked the court to postpone the case to September with the hope that the two accused’s financial assistance applications would have received a response by then.
The three accused have all been released on R5 000 bail, while a date for the matter to be heard at the North Gauteng High Court has already been set, from October 10 to early December.
African News Agency