Johannesburg - The purge of high-ranking police officials seen as too close to suspended national commissioner General Riah Phiyega appears to have started in earnest - two officials have been targeted so far for dismissal.
This week, police spokesman Lieutenant-General Solomon Makgale was slapped with a notice of intention of his suspension.
He was given seven days to respond. The notice was despite an incomplete parliamentary inquiry into his conduct.
On Wednesday, deputy national commissioner of corporate service management Lieutenant-General Christabel Nobulele Mbekela was also served with a notice of suspension.
In a move which she described as a witch-hunt, she was served a Section 35 notice of termination earlier this month.
A Section 35 discharge is known within police circles as a golden handshake because those who receive it are paid out the rest of their contract in full.
Soon after being slapped with the notice, Mbekela applied for an interdict against acting police commissioner Lieutenant-General Khomotso Phahlane and Police Minister Nathi Nhleko in the Labour Court.
After The Star sent Phahlane questions about this, Mbekela received the suspension notice.
The Star understands the Labour Court case was withdrawn two weeks ago as Phahlane told the court Mbekela’s termination was not imminent.
According to the court papers, Mbekela was attempting to interdict the acting commissioner from restructuring the top management of the police while he was in a temporary position.
“The first respondent is holding the post temporarily but his arbitrary haste and malicious acts and intentions must be stopped before more damage is done,” Mbekela said in the papers.
She said that at a meeting, Phahlane told her that even though he was aware the minister had signed and approved an application she had made to defer her retirement for three years, he wanted to release her from the service.
“That the first respondent had me in his sight as his first victim shows his malicious, arbitrary intention. He is a law unto himself,” Mbekela said.
The reasons she gave for wanting her retirement deferred was that she was working on four projects which had not been completed.
Mbekela told The Star that she felt that she had no choice but to take the matter to court.
“What was confusing me was the speed with which everything was being done. What this is, is a witch-hunt. It is sinister and makes no sense.”
Phahlane said he wanted Mbekela’s projects to be run by line managers and not centralised at deputy national commissioner level.
He said in the papers it was too early to decide what he would do, as events in Parliament were still unfolding.
The parliamentary portfolio committee on police adopted a resolution recommending that Phiyega, the two deputy national commissioners and the nine provincial commissioners be subject to an inquiry, arising from conduct which they considered to be irregular.
Police spokesman Brigadier Hangwani Mulaudzi said the court process was internal and not for public consumption.
He denied that Mbekela was offered a golden handshake.
“We reject spurious suggestions that the SAPS is waging a witch-hunt against anyone in the SAPS.”
The Star
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