Hawks colonel questioned as Nomgcobo Jiba docket vanishes

A police docket against former deputy director of public prosecutions Nomgcobo Jiba has gone missing and the Hawks are looking among their own members for answers.

The matter has been referred to the Independent Police Investigative Directorate for possible criminal investigation.

Jiba was facing charges of perjury and fraud for the unlawful authorisation of racketeering charges as well as murder and attempted murder charges against former KwaZulu-Natal Hawks head Johan Booysen and several of his colleagues in 2012, when she was the acting prosecutions boss at the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA).

She relinquished her acting position in 2013 when Mxolisi Nxasana took over.

He was unceremoniously fired by former president Jacob Zuma in 2015.

The case against Booysen and members of the Cato Manor organised crime unit were thrown out by the Durban High Court.

The court found that Jiba’s decision was arbitrary, offended the principle of legality and the rule of law, and was unconstitutional.

It ordered that she be criminally charged.

After taking over from Nxasana as national director of public prosecutions, Shaun Abrahams re-instated the charges against Booysen and his colleagues.

In the same period, Abrahams withdrew charges against Jiba, who was a key ally of his in what was a faction-riddled NPA.

After Shamila Batohi took over as national director of public prosecutions in February last year, the two cases were among a raft of matters she asked to be reviewed by her senior staff.

The reviews resulted in charges against Booysen and his colleagues being withdrawn.

While the matter of Jiba’s charges was still in limbo, civil rights organisation AfriForum’s private prosecutions unit wrote a letter to Batohi in December last year, enquiring about the case.

A senior prosecutor said AfriForum’s private prosecutions unit head Gerrie Nel submitted an application seeking to compel the NPA to issue a certificate of nolle prosequi, an official confirmation that the prosecution was no longer proceeding.

Even though Batohi acknowledged Nel’s application, it is not clear whether she committed to any direction.

City Press has established from reliable security cluster sources that Jiba is not off the hook, however, as plans to charge her again are under way.

The sources say a new criminal docket is being assembled.

“The NPA has decided that she should be charged again. The announcement will be made public once her legal team and other preparations are made,” said one law enforcement officer privy to the details.

It has now emerged that the original docket is missing and a Hawks colonel based at the elite unit headquarters in Tshwane was questioned about the disappearance last month.

When the colonel, who used to be in former Hawks head Berning Ntlemeza’s inner circle, could not find the docket or explain its whereabouts, the Hawks decided to launch disciplinary proceedings against him.

Hawks spokesperson Brigadier Hangwani Mulaudzi last week confirmed that a colonel was being pursued for the missing docket.

“There is an internal and independent process pending against those who are behind or might have a played a role in the disappearance of the docket. Since the matter is still under investigation, please appreciate that there is an internal process currently under way, therefore we will not be in a position to divulge their names,” Mulaudzi said in an email response to City Press inquiries.

The issue of police dockets going missing has been an ongoing headache for the SA Police Service, resulting in many cases being thrown out of court.

The service is rapidly rolling out a computerised system known as eDocket to counter the problem.

NPA spokesperson Bulelwa Makeke declined to comment on the pending NPA decision, saying “we cannot legitimise leaks from prosecutors on litigation matters”.

In her testimony before the commission of inquiry headed by retired Constitutional Court Justice Yvonne Mokgoro last year, Jiba blamed the NPA for having charged her for doing her job.

“People were killed in circumstances where they posed no danger at all. Some of them were killed in front of their wives,” she said about the Booysen criminal case.

Jiba said on Saturday that she stood by her testimony.

“It saddens me that people were killed and no one has been held accountable. I am not aware that they have decided to pursue the charges and my attorney of record was also not informed.”

Last year, a report by the commission hammered the nail in her coffin when it found her and colleague Lawrence Mrwebi to be unfit to hold public office.

It said the two had “allowed and enabled the independence of the NPA to be compromised”.

Jiba is now restarting her advocate career from scratch, beginning with pupillage under the recently formed Pan African Bar Association of SA.

Abram Mashego Senior journalist | City Press

+27 11 713 9001 abram.mashego@citypress.co.za Media Park, 69 Kingsway Road, Auckland Park

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