Johannesburg - The Independent Police Investigative Directorate (Ipid) started probing a scandal involving National Police Commissioner General Riah Phiyega after crime intelligence opened a case against her in 2013.
This was after crime intelligence operatives picked up a conversation between Phiyega and Western Cape police commissioner Arno Lamoer in which she alerted him about an investigation against him by the Hawks and the Crime Intelligence Unit.
In a recorded conversation between Phiyega and Lamoer, she is heard alerting him to the probe by the Hawks and crime intelligence because of a link between him and an alleged Cape Town drug dealer.
Crime intelligence operatives said they had been legally recording conversations between Lamoer and the alleged dealer when they picked up a conversation between Phiyega and Lamoer.
During the conversation, Phiyega makes Lamoer aware that Hawks boss Anwa Dramat is conducting the probe and also discloses that the then acting head of crime intelligence, Chris Ngcobo, had told her they were investigating him. “I did not commission that investigation,” Phiyega said in the recording.
After listening to the recordings, the Crime Intelligence operatives decided to lay a charge of defeating the ends of justice against Phiyega.
A few days after crime intelligence laid the charge against Phiyega, she issued a suspension letter against the acting crime intelligence head, Chris Ngcobo, over his qualifications. Ngcobo, the former head of the VIP protection unit in KwaZulu-Natal, was appointed acting head of intelligence in place of the suspended Richard Mdluli in June last year.
Ngcobo is still on suspension, without pay.
Brigadier Mzwandile Tiyo, who was acting crime intelligence head in the Western Cape, was also abruptly removed.
Tiyo was on leave when he was removed, and replaced by another high-ranking police officer.
At the time, Phiyega’s spokesman Solomon Makgale dismissed the claims.
Makgale said Tiyo’s removal was part of the restructuring of the crime intelligence service.
The Sunday Independent