Cape Town - A horrible week for Hawks boss Mthandazo Ntlemeza culminated in a grilling in Parliament on Friday over apparently politically motivated investigations and arrests and his request for an increased budget without a proper motivation.
This came a day after former Gauteng Hawks head Shadrack Sibiya, who has accused Ntlemeza of having ulterior motives for targeting him, was acquitted on fraud charges involving travel claims.
Ntlemeza, meanwhile, was the subject this week of an urgent application by the Helen Suzman Foundation and Freedom Under Law for an interdict preventing him from continuing in the job, pending the outcome of an application to have his appointment set aside.
The application is based on comments by a judge to the effect that Ntlemeza had been biased and dishonest in an affidavit presented in Sibiya’s challenge against his suspension.
The foundation and Freedom Under Law argued that Police Minister Nathi Nhleko failed to take the judge’s comments into account when appointing Ntlemeza to the key position.
Ntlemeza was on Friday asked searching questions by MPs over a series of investigations, including questions sent to Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan in an investigation into an alleged rogue intelligence unit at Sars, the arrest last week of private investigator Paul O’Sullivan and the arrest of #FeesMust Fall activist Vusi Mahlangu.
DA MP Zakhele Mbhele said the arrest of O’Sullivan on charges related to a breach of the Citizens Act, and Mahlangu for perjury, seemed to fall outside the Hawks’ mandate to target serious organised crime and corruption.
As the Hawks were before Parliament’s police oversight committee to seek approval of their budget, the appearance of a deviation from their mandate raised the question, “is the budget we’re dealing with here going to be used effectively in service of the public”?
Mbhele also asked for an assurance the Hawks would be impartial in investigating high-profile officials, such as KwaZulu-Natal police commissioner Mmamonnye Ngobeni.
After MPs were cautioned by the committee’s chairman, Francois Beukman, not to ask specific questions about operational matters, EFF MP Philip Mhlongo said the Hawks had to say how they would “clear their image” which had been tarnished “for whatever reasons”.
Ntlemeza responded by saying the fact that the Hawks were “hitting” high-profile individuals led to complaints by some who were “not supposed to be hit, somebody who is immune, who is above the law”.
Beukman reiterated a previous call for the Hawks to stick to their operational guidelines and avoid “running commentary in the media” on cases.
ANC MP Leonard Ramatlakane said Ntlemeza’s request for more funds, after he complained he was getting just one percent of the police budget, had to be motivated by a proper plan for how the money would be spent.
It emerged the Hawks had not provided the Treasury with a detailed motivation for increased funding in the latest budgeting round.
Without something on paper there was little the committee could do to help, Ramatlakane said.
Ntlemeza had complained he had to fill in an application whenever he needed to travel urgently by air for operations, resulting in even junior police officials being aware of his movements.
This could endanger him, Ntlemeza said, asking for funds for a jet or helicopter, and suggesting the Hawks should become a separate budget vote in the long term.
The requirement for the Hawks to be operationally independent was confirmed in a Constitutional Court judgment in November 2014.
It removed the minister’s powers to suspend or remove its head.
One the Treasury has provided the funds, the unit budget is ring fenced and can be amended only by Parliament.
Political Bureau