“Winnie Mandela was out of control. She was more out of control than her bodyguard.”
These are the words of Warrant Officer Jannie Odendaal – who, along with Constable Abel Twala, was involved in an altercation with Winnie Madikizela-Mandela and her bodyguard Jacob Monare late last year – in a video he posted on YouTube.
Odendaal and Twala, represented by Solidarity, are consulting attorneys and plan to lay formal criminal charges against Madikizela-Mandela and Monare next week.
“It took a while for the car to pull over after the police vehicle had put on its sirens and blue light,” Odendaal says in the video.
“A passenger, identified later as one of Mandela’s bodyguards, ran to me and pushed me with both hands very forcibly.
“He is quite a big guy, a bigger oke than me. He then told me we cannot search his vehicle. It was not apartheid any more. I then ran back to my vehicle to get a Taser gun and said: ‘Listen, I will Taser you if you insult me again’.”
Just then (Madikizela-Mandela) got out of her vehicle. She started shouting and screaming ‘Who the f***ing hell do you think you are?’ She was shouting it repeatedly. She was way out of control. Hey, she was more out of control than her bodyguard.”
In January, Madikizela-Mandela and Monare laid charges of intimidation and pointing a firearm. The National Prosecuting Authority then sent the docket back to the police for further investigation.
Odendaal and Twala, previously with the Flying Squad in Hillbrow, have been redeployed.
Solidarity’s Dirk Herman told the Saturday Star yesterday the officers’ employer was siding with the “political elite”.
“But we are not going to be pushed around.
The officers investigate and deal with serious matters, including armed robbers, rapists and murderers. They at all times have to be prepared for anything. When they pull over a car, driving recklessly, with tinted windows, they have to be prepared for the worst.
“They were just doing their jobs, and doing them well and now they’re the ones being investigated.”
Herman was referring to the criminal case as well as an internal police investigation. - Saturday Star