Durban -
If KwaZulu-Natal police commissioner Mmamonnye Ngobeni paid for her husband’s lavish birthday party, where is the proof?
This is what advocate Tembeka Ngcukaitobi wants to know.
“She attaches not a shred of evidence to illustrate that she ever paid for it,” he told the Durban High Court on Tuesday, when Ngobeni’s application to set aside her recent suspension was argued before Judge Nkosinathi Chili.
Ngobeni attended proceedings in dark sunglasses and with a posse of supporters, including her husband, Lucas.
Ngcukaitobi is representing acting national commissioner Lieutenant-General Johannes Phahlane, who is opposing Ngobeni’s application and has labelled it an attempt at avoiding a probe into her fitness to hold office.
Phahlane suspended Ngobeni last month, pending the outcome of a commission of inquiry. This is in connection with allegations of misconduct centred on Ngobeni’s relationship with one-time fraud accused businessman Thoshan Panday, who apparently bankrolled a lavish birthday party for Ngobeni’s husband.
Ngobeni says she paid Panday’s company, Gold Coast Trading CC, to arrange the party.
But Ngcukaitobi said on Tuesday that there was not “a single document” showing a payment flowing from Ngobeni to Panday. “All we have are protestation affidavits,” he said.
The highest watermark of her case, he went on, was a receipt generated by Panday. However, this was, in fact, not a receipt of money, but an invoice. “And an invoice can be generated at any stage.”
Arguing against Ngobeni’s claims that Phahlane was acting out of turn in instituting the establishment of a commission of inquiry, Ngcukaitobi said the acting national commissioner was right in saying it was time for her to “answer to an independent party”.
“This is probably one of the grossest forms of misconduct a provincial commissioner can be accused of ... If these allegations are true, this is the most serious violation of the entire institution of police,” he said.
But for Ngobeni, advocate Greg Harpur argued that in terms of the police act, the acting national commissioner was not endowed with the power to establish a commission of inquiry into allegations of misconduct on the part of a provincial commissioner, “at his whim”. “We are not a police state,” Harpur argued.
Harpur said correct procedure dictated that the notice to set up a commission had to come from the minister of police, and this was not the case in this instance.
On Ngobeni’s suspension, Harpur said it prejudiced Ngobeni and was not in the best interests of the public either.
In addition to Ngobeni’s receiving her full salary while suspended, the acting provincial commissioner was also being paid, Harpur said.
“It doesn’t make economic sense.”
Judgment on the matter has been reserved.
The Mercury