The Cabinet has appealed for calm in the wake of the fatal shooting by police of Ficksburg protester Andries Tatane – describing the circumstances of his death, and that of a young woman police constable shot dead after an ATM bombing in Katlehong this week, as “unfortunate”.
Cabinet spokesman Jimmy Manyi would not say, however, whether Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa had been asked to brief the cabinet at its meeting on Wednesday on the events during the service protest that led to Tatane’s death. Mthethwa has come under fire. “In your hands you have… the cabinet’s statement on the matter and there are no further details,” Manyi said.
The statement said: “The cabinet urges all South Africans to remain calm and let the law take its course.” It went on to call on policemen and policewomen to “remain true and faithful to their oath and responsibility to fight crime”.
Constable Fihliwe Mavis Bengeza, 25, died on Monday after being shot at the scene of an ATM bombing at the Zonkizizwe taxi rank in Katlehong.
Police said her colleague, Constable Sihle Mbatha, was recovering in hospital after being shot in the leg. President Jacob Zuma said on Wednesday that the shooting was “tragic and unacceptable”.
This was two days after he told The Mercury that Tatane’s death – which he at that point understood to have been caused by police beating the community activist – “indicates a very strange mentality in terms of the police force”.
It has since been established that Tatane’s death was caused by his being shot at close range.
Two more Bloemfontein officers appeared in the Ficksburg Magistrate’s Court yesterday over the death of Tatane, in addition to the six policemen that have been arrested, two of whom face murder charges while four are accused of causing grievous bodily harm.
The two officers’ defence lawyer, Koos de Beer, asked magistrate Alfred Mralasi to ban all video cameras and cellphones from court. The State asked the court to postpone the case and transfer it to the regional court. It would be joined with that of the six other policemen. The State also asked that the two men be kept in custody until their bail application on Tuesday.
The police watchdog, the Independent Complaints Directorate, is investigating. - Political Bureau and Sapa