Durban – Barely hours after the Durban High Court overturned the suspension of KwaZulu-Natal Hawks boss Maj-Gen Johan Booysen, the Hawks informed him that they would be appealing the ruling.
Brigadier Brigadier Hangwani Mulaudzi, spokesman for the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation, or the Hawks as they are commonly known, said on Wednesday afternoon that Booysen’s lawyers had been informed of the decision to appeal.
“We are appealing it. We have already informed Maj-Gen Booysen’s counsel of our intention. The documentation [for an appeal] is being prepared. We have 10 days to lodge an appeal,” said Mulaudzi.
However, Mulaudzi would not be drawn to say on what grounds the appeal was being made.
“I am not a lawyer,” was his response.
In overturning the suspension earlier on Wednesday, Judge Anton van Zyl ruled that national Hawks boss Berning Ntlemeza did not have a case against Booysen, whom he has accused of fraud.
“There is not even prima facie evidence that such fraud had been committed, or if it had that the applicant is implicated therein,” said Van Zyl.
Not only did the judge say that there was insufficient evidence to back up the allegations, he also ordered that Ntlemeza be barred from suspending Booysen again pending the outcome of the current disciplinary process.
Van Zyl also ordered Ntlemeza, in his capacity as the national head the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation, to pay Booysen’s legal expenses.
Shortly after Ntlemeza was as appointed national head of the Hawks, he suspended Booysen on September 14.
Booysen was suspended amid allegations of fraud amounting to R15 384,62 – an allegation that he has denied.
Ntlemeza’s legal team had argued that the court was not the proper forum to hear an application against the suspension, but Van Zyl ruled that the court was entitled to hear it.
Ntlemeza, in his submissions to court, claimed that Booysen and the men tasked with investigating a police officer’s assassination fraudulently received a monetary reward for shooting dead six innocent men.
Ntlemeza further claimed that while the award was for tracking down the men who assassinated Superintendent Zethembe Chonco in August 2008, the case numbers used to secure the award were for unrelated cases in Howick of housebreaking and motor vehicle theft.
Booysen was accused of supplying false case numbers in a bid to obtain the award.
Booysen, however, denied authoring the document which resulted in him and his men receiving the award for tracking down and killing Chonco’s killers. He denied that he had anything to do with the granting of the award.
In his ruling, Van Zyl questioned why Ntlemeza had chosen to ignore Booysen’s representation and evidence.
The judge also stated that Ntlemeza could not simply suspend a person and that there had to be “a rational basis” for a suspension.
He also said that Ntlemeza not only got the amount of the award wrong, the evidence clearly showed that Booysen had no role in the awarding of the R10 000 award.
“There is not a shred of evidence that the applicant [Booysen] was in any way involved in formulating its (the award’s) content and the respondent’s (Ntlemeza) conclusion to the contrary is at best, entirely speculative,” said Van Zyl.
The judge said it was striking that Ntlemeza had opted to implement disciplinary proceedings despite a lack of information to back up his allegations against Booysen.
“The conduct of the respondent (Ntlemeza) nevertheless deserves censure and as a mark of the court’s disapproval I consider the the costs on a scale as between attorney and client would be justified,” said Van Zyl.
Referring to Booysen’s assertion that there had been repeated attempts to remove him from office, Van Zyl said that there had not been sufficient evidence for him to rule on the issue, but said that: “A strong suggestion arises that there is an ongoing move, possibly even a campaign to unseat the applicant (Booysen).”
Mulaudzi said that in light of the fact that Booysen has been informed of the intended appeal, Booysen would not be allowed to return to work until the appeal had been resolved.
African News Agency
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