Johannesburg - A secret meeting national police commissioner Riah Phiyega held with a select group of police generals and at which they compiled the Marikana intervention plan, is threatening to tear police headquarters apart as senior officers begin to break ranks.
It is alleged that at this meeting, held on August 15, 2012, Phiyega and several police generals decided that weapons such as R5 rifles should be used to quell the mine violence and that police mortuary vans be organised.
Phiyega and other police officers denied before the Farlam Commission that the extraordinary meeting discussed these aspects of the “intervention” and refused to disclose minutes of the meeting.
It has now emerged that several high-ranking police officers have approached their lawyers in an attempt to disclose this information as they fear the inquiry into Phiyega’s fitness to hold office will uncover details of such a meeting.
At least one of the provincial commissioners is understood to have submitted an affidavit about the secret meeting.
In the wake of the Farlam report on the Marikana massacre which, among other things, recommended the prosecution of police officers responsible for the deaths of 34 striking mineworkers, The Sunday Independent understands that several senior police officers are reporting in sick on days when they consult their lawyers.
The generals also allege that former North West police commissioner Zukiswa Mbombo, who resigned in May, two months before the end of her contract, knew she would be implicated in the commission’s findings.
As the Marikana divide widens, some of the police generals, who are members of the SAPS national management forum (NMF), are privately calling on Phiyega to “come clean” about the Marikana intervention plan, which they allege was secretly discussed with a select group of generals and not with all the NMF members..
The generals refer to page 515 of the Marikana report, which reads: “The leadership of the police, on the highest level, appears to have taken the decision not to give the true version of how it came about that the ‘tactical option’ was implemented on the afternoon of 16 August 2012 and to conceal the fact that the plan to be implemented was hastily put together without (public order policing) inputs or evaluation.
“In order to give effect to this, the decision (at the NMF) was not disclosed to the commission. An inaccurate set of minutes for the 06h30 meeting (on August 16) was prepared and a number of SAPS witnesses testified before the commission in support of the incorrect version.
“There is at least a prima facie case that the national commissioner (Phiyega) and the commissioner for the North West province, who knew the true facts, approved Exhibit L (the SAPS presentation) which contained the incorrect facts.”
The members, who asked not to be identified, denied that any intervention plan had been discussed at the NMF meeting.
“Minutes taken by Brigadier Sheila Malahlela should indicate that the meeting was adjourned because the commissioner left us to hold a secret meeting regarding the intervention plan with a select group of police leadership. It is at that secret meeting that it was decided that weapons such as the R5 rifles should be used and mortuary vans organised.”
Police spokesman Lieutenant-General Solomon Makgale said: “It is a pity The Sunday Independent elected to ignore information that is publicly available, which contradicts what the faceless sources told the publication.”
Makgale said no operational plan regarding dispersal was discussed during the extraordinary meeting. The purpose of the meeting was to discuss logistical support such as additional personnel and equipment such as Nyalas and water cannon.
“There was never a discussion about R5s and mortuary vans. Your sources were not part of the meeting and do not know who made the alleged request for additional R5s and mortuary vans,” Makgale said.
“It is a matter of public record that the meeting was attended by the national commissioner, provincial commissioners, General (Elias) Mawela and the then-acting head of Crime Intelligence, General Chris Ngcobo and former Deputy National Commissioner of Operations Lieutenant-General (Fannie) Masemola. “It is also a matter of public record that the meeting took place after the NMF session... The meeting was not recorded as it was not a formal meeting.”
The Sunday Independent