Cape Town - Former provincial head of detectives Jeremy Vearey has instructed his lawyers to submit a contempt of court report following what he said was the failure of the provincial police commissioner, Thembisile Patekile, to properly implement the Western Cape High Court’s order to reinstate his security detail.
Vearey and his family remain in hiding.
On Thursday, the Western Cape High Court ordered that National Police Commissioner Khehla Sitole and Patekile assign Vearey two members of the Tactical Response Team who had been vetted and appraised of security threats against him, and four members be provided when Vearey was required to attend court to testify and for necessary travel.
In a statement, Vearey said despite the order, only two officers reported for duty with one vehicle on Friday, as Patekile had instructed. He said this was a downgrade, as he previously had a four-member escort team with two vehicles.
“One of them told me he was called directly by the provincial acting head of legal services Brigadier Jojo and instructed accordingly on the deployment. Patekile also did not want me to ride in a police vehicle, so they were instructed to do mere escort services. They have no brief to cover me 24 hours, and will only work normal shift hours then leave,” said Vearey.
He said Patekile and Jojo’s instructions did not include static protection at home, independent of the mobile in-transit protection, which, he said, was a further downgrade of deployment, despite the fact that the risk had escalated and the threat had not changed.
Vearey said he would remain in hiding until the police management read and implemented the court order “properly without malice or further deliberately recklessly endangering my life”.
“It also recklessly endangers the lives of only two SAPS members assigned to me and can become a labour dispute in terms of their occupational health and safety,” he said.
Whistle-blower and community activist Colin Arendse said Vearey was being targeted by police managers under the watch of General Sitole, who had deliberately misread the court order.
“The insurrection that the president routinely referred to on Friday is staring him in the face in the form of the rogue police crime intel unit. Colonel Charl Kinnear was assassinated after exposing them, and General Peter Jacobs was demoted after warning police management of the dangers posed by this corrupt unit.
“General Vearey also referred to this illegal rogue unit in his court papers as he will be testifying about them in the guns-to-gangs case next month. With such blatant contempt by dodgy cops, is the government really in control of the insurrection they keep on referring to?” said Arendse.
Police spokesperson Andrè Traut said issues of security and/or guard duties for certain individuals as a result of an identified threat were best not discussed in the public domain.
“It is therefore recommended that the affected parties raise whatever concerns they have about their safety and security with the relevant authority within SAPS,” said Traut.