Riah Phiyega – praag.org

Police commissioner confident charges against her ‘will not stick’

Allegations of defeating the ends of justice against national police commissioner Riah Phiyega “will not stick”, she said on Friday.

“You can try as much as you like, but you will not succeed. No mud thrown at me will stick,” she said in a statement on Friday morning in response to a report in The Star newspaper.

“I remain determined to ensure that nothing, absolutely nothing, deters me and my leadership team from the new journey of rebuilding SAPS [SA Police Service], especially the crime intelligence division.”

The Star reported on Friday that Phiyega allegedly tipped off a senior police officer of a crime intelligence investigation against him into allegations that he had accepted a bribe from a criminal.

But Phiyega denied tipping off the officer, saying he had become aware of the investigation after the opposition Democratic Alliance asked a question about it in Parliament.

Also, Phiyega said it was “interesting” that the allegations against her surfaced from “faceless people” shortly after her decision to put former acting crime intelligence boss Maj-Gen Chris Ngcobo on special leave.

Ngcobo was this week placed on special leave after a vetting process allegedly found discrepancies in his qualifications.

Phiyega said she was not formally informed of the case of defeating the ends of justice opened against her but that she was aware of the allegations.

The allegations were from people who wanted to “discredit” her, Phiyega’s office said in the statement.

“Although general Phiyega does not expect her colleagues to behave in such an underhanded manner whereby they concoct a story and then open a case against her, it however, comes as no surprise given some of the mischievous activities conducted by crime intelligence in the past.

“It is clear that this is a lame attempt by certain individuals within crime intelligence to discredit her and derail the process of flushing out those within the SAPS who have no integrity and have no interest in taking the SAPS forward,” the statement read.

Phiyega placed Ngcobo on special leave on Monday, instructing that criminal investigations and disciplinary action against him be initiated.

Maj-Gen Bongiwe Zulu has assumed Ngcobo’s role until further notice.

The Star, quoting “highly placed sources”, said Ngcobo instructed crime intelligence officers to open the case against Phiyega on October 19.

Explaining the alleged tip-off she gave, Phiyega said a question was received in Parliament from the DA as to whether there was an investigation into a bribery matter against a certain provincial commissioner.

During the process of gathering information to enable the police department to prepare a response, the DA enquiry ended up in the provincial commissioner’s office after passing through various officials.

At that point the commissioner called Phiyega to ask about the investigation so it could not be argued that she alerted the commissioner about the investigation, her office said.

“Simply put, the national commissioner committed no crime,” the statement read. – Sapa

Too many police employees with criminal records

An audit has revealed that 1448 police employees have committed crimes themselves, the police ministry said on Sunday.

“The audit established that 1448 members have criminal offences,” Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa said in a statement.

The audit into how many current employees of the SA Police Service (SAPS) have criminal records had been going on for two years, he said.

Mthethwa said that the next step would be for national police commissioner Riah Phiyega to decide what action should be taken.

“I have now instructed her and the management team that feedback on action should be provided to me by the end of October this year.” He said that going forward there would be a legal process “where everyone will be given an opportunity to state his or her side of the story”.

“That said, our resolve to root out any unwanted elements within the police will never be deterred by anything, no matter how long and what it takes.” Mthethwa said the audit had taken longer than expected because the ministry wanted to ensure it was thorough.

The audit had also revealed that there were “serious challenges” regarding the management of discipline in the department.

Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa and police commissioner Riah Phiyega should resign, the SA Policing Union (Sapu) said on Monday.

“[We] call on [them] to…do the honourable thing — resign from their positions,” the union’s leader Mpho Kwinika said in a statement.

“We have been calling for a judicial commission of inquiry into the SA Police Service simply because there is no leadership and management in the police.”

Sapu was reacting to the outcome of the audit released by the police ministry on Sunday. – Sapa

Crime scene tampering at Marikana: Commissioner knew

National police commissioner Riah Phiyega knew there was evidence to suggest that one of the crime scenes where 34 protesters were shot dead by police on August 16 had been tampered with, the Farlam Commission of Inquiry heard on Monday.

Ismael Semenya for the police said: “The national commissioner has instituted an investigation.”

He said the matter came to Phiyega’s attention two weeks ago and that she immediately launched a probe to establish what had happenened.

Semenya said this after it became apparent that photographs taken on the night of August 16 showed more traditional weapons around the bodies of the slain miners than photographs taken earlier that day.

Evidence leader Mbuyisela Madlanga was cross-examining crime scene expert Captain Apollo Mohlaki when it became clear that scene two, in the vicinity of a koppie near Lonmin’s Marikana mine in Rustenburg, had been altered between the times when the pictures were taken.

Madlanga showed Mohlaki three photographs of each of three bodies.

Two were taken in daylight and one by electric light after dark. Mohlaki took the night pictures and admitted his photographs showed more weapons around the bodies than those taken earlier.

Referring to the night-time photograph of the corpse of Henry Mvuyisi Pato, Madlanga asked whether Mohlaki could see a butcher’s knife and an iron rod.

“That weapon is underneath the hand or arm of the deceased?”

Drawing attention to the photographs of the same body taken in daylight, Madlanga asked: “Quite plainly, that butcher’s knife is not there?”.

“It is not appearing, I don’t see it,” Mohlaki replied.

George Bizos, for the Legal Resource Centre, asked: “Who were the people who had the opportunity to really insult the administration of justice in our country?…This came as a big surprise to us.”

Commission chairman, retired judge Ian Farlam, said it came as a surprise “to all of us”.

Last week Semenya said the integrity of the crime scene could have been compromised by the presence of paramedics.

“No blame on your team, but your scene was corrupt?” he asked Mohlaki.

“We will hear evidence that paramedics asked that weapons be removed so they could do their work,” said Semenya.

Also on Monday, Dali Mpofu, the attorney for injured and arrested Lonmin miners, claimed some of the shot miners seemed to be handcuffed in a video entered as evidence.

He asked Mohlaki whether he had seen any protesters — whether dead, injured or arrested — with their hands bound behind their backs.

Mohlaki said he had not, but conceded that on a video shown to the commission it appeared to be the case.

“At the crime scene I never observed that…. I never went to individual bodies to see which one was handcuffed, which one was injured…

“If I am looking at the video there is a person, handcuffed possibly, but on the day I did not observe that.”

The video showed the dead bodies of the miners lying at unnatural angles among large rocks.

Towards the end of the video, loud laughter could be heard, but the group laughing was not visible.

Asked what police might have found so amusing at the scene of so many violent deaths, Mohlaki said: “I have no idea.”

During the afternoon session, the parties debated the usefulness of separating elements of the inquiry into phases.

Semenya objected to the fisrt phase being dominated by the policeºs conduct on August 16.

“From our perspective, it is an open secret that SAPS has been found guilty in the court of public opinion,” he said.

Semenya argued that the contributions of the National Union of Mineworkers, the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union, Lonmin, the actions of angry crowds, and preceding events needed to be taken into account to contextualise the August 16 shootings. – citizen.co.za

Did South African police kill at Marikana to help black billionaire Ramaphosa’s finances?

lonmim-massacre — The scene at Marikana, north west of Johannesburg, last week

Over the past few days PRAAG obtained new information about the Marikana massacre that is currently still making frontpage news in South Africa. It appears as if the miners of the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (AMCU) were deliberately murdered by the police as part of a campaign to get rid of the bothersome union.

AMCU was busy replacing the NUM (National Union of Mineworkers) as the majority union at the mine. The NUM is affiliated with COSATU, which is a member of the ANC regime’s so-called “tripartite alliance”. Before the shooting started, police ordered the media to leave the area.

Lauren Clifford-Holmes, the multimedia editor for the Johannesburg Mail & Guardian, was prevented last Thursday night from speaking to injured mineworkers. However, she stumbled upon two workers at Lonmin who confirmed that strife between the two trade unions was responsible for the problems, as NUM representatives were not re-elected by dissatisfied miners.

Black businessman and high-ranking ANC politician, Cyril Ramaphosa, apparently owns a contract to supply labour to the Lonmin mine at Marikana via his company Shanduka. “Ramaphosa and the NUM is practising a form of slave labour at the mine,” a source said at Marikana. “He is supplying labour at about R12 000 ($1500) per worker per month, but only pay his workers R4000 ($500) per month, thereby pocketing the difference. As a former NUM chief, he is able to control the union leaders and sees to it that he maintains this grotesque form of exploitation.”

However, NUM’s rival, AMCU, demands that the R12 000 received by Shanduka as labour broker in terms of the contract, should be paid directly to workers. Particularly the rock drillers, who perform the most difficult and dangerous work, felt that they were entitled to this wage, given that this was the tariff already received by Cyril Ramaphosa’s company for work at the mine.

An ex-policeman that PRAAG spoke to, but who prefers to remain anonymous, said that judging from the photographs he had seen, the workers were not attacking the police, but were fleeing from an area where a second police contingent was throwing tear gas at them. “One could see how some of them were trying to protect their eyes and faces. They thought they were fleeing to a safe place, where the heavily armed policemen mowed them down with automatic weapons, however,” said the ex-policeman.

The motive for the mass murder at the Lonmin mine at Marikana was apparently the protection of Shanduka’s lucrative service contract for supplying labour to the mine. Shanduka has already annouced that it will donate R2 million for the funeral of the 34 workers.

The workers are mostly from Lesotho, an independent country, and areas in the Eastern Cape. It would therefore be difficult for them to defend their rights and lives against the ANC-controlled state, cooperating closely with the British-controlled mining company. Until now, the only questions abut the massacre have come from black politicians and activists from outside governing ANC circles.

A group known as the September National Imbizi did a local investitagion and talked to an eyewitness alleging that the mineworkers were “drawn into an ambush” and that they were first bombarded with a “blue substance”, after which they were shot dead during the confusion. Many were executed while trying to hide among rocks and under bushes. On the websit of September National Imbizo, the eyewitness is referred to as “our friend”:

“…our friend shows us how several people were shot while they were hiding between the rocks and under bushes. We see for ourselves splatters of blood that indicate the determination to dig workers out of their hiding holes and shoot them dead. All sorts of items of clothing and shoes, soiled with blood lie all around the scene.”

The website also claims:

“What is clear from what we are told is that this was an ambush. The video material in mainstream media showing workers charging at the police was in fact workers running away from bullets being hurled from behind. Why would workers, armed with knobkierries [African-style clubs – ed.] charge at armed police? The workers were completely surrounded and what we’ve been seeing in the media is only half the story. There was clearly a mission: shoot to kill, thus the deployment of the army.”

Other strange incidents took place.

The media were kept away from the scene for hours so that it would be difficult to reconstruct the exact events. A contact of The Star newspaper was shot dead during the massacre. The police also forced a photographer from the Johannesburg Mail & Guardian to delete his photographs. Why were the police so scared that particular evidence regarding the shooting would leak out?

A video shown in the Netherlands, contained a Vodafone ambulance on the scene. The same vido was later shown in South Africa on News24.com, but without the ambulance, indicating that the video must have been edited.

Beforehand SAPA reported the following statement by the leader of the AMCU:

“We are not safe. Our phones have been tapped,” the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union president Joseph Mathenjwa told a crowd in the Wonderkop informal settlement at Lonmin.

“We have been democratically colonised – workers work under very harsh conditions.”

After the massacre Mathenjwa demanded a really independent investigation, but the ANC simply appointed one of its own ministers, Collins Chabane, to lead the commission of enquiry. Under the previous, so-called “apartheid government” judges were always appointed to commissions of enquiry.

What Mathenjwa is probably referring to when he talks of “democratic colonisation”, is that workers are paid R4000 per month while Cyril Ramphosa is receiving three times as much per worker.

A Johannesburg businessman PRAAG spoke to and who is also in the services sector, confirmed that the ANC’s cadres have virtually instituted a system of “slave labour” in the country. The former officers of their militia, Umkhonto we Sizwe, is currently providing labour to the mines by recruting foreigners. Few, if any, mines still employ workers directly.

“Everything which the ANC described as apartheid, including the system of migrant labour, now applies, except in a far worse degree,” said the businessman. “The ANC’s cadres control everything. They have dug themselves into all sectors of the economy. They do not rule, they are in business. The state is for them just another business, with resources that they may use to enrich themselves. That is what BEE stands for, Black Elite Enrichment.”

Among those state resources controlled by the ANC, is the police force. Was it used to punish the AMCU and “make an example” of the rival union? In the run-up to the 1994 elections the ANC committed necklace murders against so-called “sell-outs”. Where tens of millions of rand are at issue in the provision of labour to a mine, one may therefore expect that an organisation as ruthless as the ANC will use all means at its disposal to eliminate a rival.

During the shooting a journalist from The Star, Poloko Tau, tweeted from the scene: “Auto guns creacking [sic] and cocked like 100 at a time, scary … warzone down here, 1st shot fired … journalist running, diving and hiding amid shots, water canon spewing water at the strikers … my contact has just been shot dead …”

After the Marikana massacre, some people simply “disappeared”. SAPA reported the following:

“Around 100 women arrived at the Ga-Rankuwa Magistrate’s Court outside Pretoria today where more than 250 protesters were expected to appear for public violence.

One woman, Nombulelo Jali, 37, wept hysterically. She said police did not know what happened to her husband Themba Khalo Jali, 40, who she says was arrested on Thursday.

‘I have come all the way from Harding in KwaZulu-Natal but we can’t find him. We have frantically searched everywhere and we can’t locate him. Police took him,’ said Jali.”

Julius Malema alleges that many of the striking workers are currently detained “irregularly in a private prison”. His friend and ex-colleague from the ANC Youth League, Floyd Shivambu, also said that many of the workers were shot in the back, which would indicate that they were running away from the police when they were shot.

This could not be verified, as a security blanket has been pulled over the area and journalists are not allowed at the mine hospital.

The narrow links between the British-controlled mining houses and the ANC may be traced back many decades. The first contact between the Afrikaner establishment and the exiled ANC was arranged by the mining company Consolidated Goldfields in England during the eighties. On that occasion Thabo Mbeki and Willie Esterhuyse met each other. Their relationship later played a crucial role in the capitulation of the Afrikaner government as Esterhuyse had persuaded several cabinet ministers that the ANC could be “trusted”.

The mining houses also played a leading role in portraying the ANC as the new government for South Africa and probably entered into private agreements with the so-called “liberation movement”.

Yesterday the chairman of Lonmin, Roger Phillimore, blamed “apartheid” for the poor conditions in which his mineworkers have to live, knowing that Shanduka and Lonmin are pocketing the greater share of the mine’s income for themselves.

Julius Malema held Jacob Zuma and Cyril Ramaphosa responsible for the mass murder: “They presided over the massacre of our people… Not even the apartheid government killed as many.”

It is unclear whether the police’s actions will be investigated internally, as the executive director of South Africa’s Independent Police Investigative Directorate, Mr. Francois Beukman, has recently resigned “to pursue other interests”. He is leaving the service at the end of the month. His contract would only have expired in August 2014. At any rate, the new national police commissioner, Riah Phiyega, does not consider the shooting of 34 people “to be a massacre”.