MATHATHA TSEDU | Masemola case demands answers from NPA over Andrea Johnson

The announcement this past week that charges had been dropped against national police commissioner Gen Fannie Masemola should not only mean he returns to office.

It must particularly clear the path for the arrest of former Investigating Directorate Against Corruption (Idac) head Adv Andrea Johnson, who engineered the arrest.

Johnson has admitted to manufacturing evidence against Masemola, Crime Intelligence (CI) head Lt-Gen Dumisani Khumalo and other senior subordinates, in what was a clear plan to stage a coup at the South African Police Service (SAPS).

The evidence given at the Madlanga commission, which led to her premature retirement, is serious enough to warrant her immediate arrest.

This is important because in the climate that we are living in, where people’s confidence in the rule of law is being eroded daily due to existential realities such as the murders of mainly young women in Ekurhuleni, the fortification of law enforcement needs to be seen, not just heard in speeches by politicians.

If anyone wants to understand KwaZulu-Natal police chief Lt-Gen Nhlanhla Mkwanazi’s warning during that seminal media conference last year that we face the imminent takeover of the criminal justice system by crime syndicates, they should look at Johnson’s role as the hammer in the scheme to sabotage investigations of drug and other cartels.

All of this depended on a quasi-legal case which Johnson manufactured. This is treasonous

Self-confessed coloured MP Fadiel Adams was the anvil used to manufacture a story that formed the basis for the wholesale arrest of the CI leadership, except Maj-Gen Feroz Khan and her husband, Brig Junaid Johnson, both of whom stood to benefit as initial placeholders and eventual appointees.

In that grand scheme, Masemola’s arrest and arraignment as part of the criminals would have cleared the path for the then second in command, Maj-Gen Shadrack Sibiya, to step up. This would have completed the coup.

All of this depended on a quasi-legal case which Johnson manufactured. This is treasonous.

National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) national director Andy Mothibi said this past week that evidence that Johnson had based her case against Masemola on had been reviewed by an internal assessment panel and an independent senior counsel who found there were “no reasonable prospects of a successful prosecution”.

The file will now be handed to the Idac ombud, judge Joe Raulinga, to determine how Johnson “assessed the evidence, enrolled the matter and applied the law”. However, she was not the only one who assessed, enrolled and applied the law.

Mothibi’s predecessor, advocate Shamila Batohi, has to have given the nod for Masemola’s criminal charges. It is quite improbable that her NPA juniors would have acquiesced to those charges against the sitting national police commissioner without her nod. Her own role in this should be investigated and Mothibi should start an internal investigation.

Johnson had direct dealings with then police minister Senzo Mchunu in pushing her scheme. Mchunu provided the political cover by, among others, closing down the political killings task team, which had started arresting drug syndicate members in Gauteng who were apparently poised to fund his campaign to become ANC president.

That, according to President Cyril Ramaphosa, Mchunu still deserves a ministerial salary and all associated perks 14 months after his special leave, boggles the mind.

The police need not feel constrained that acting against Johnson could be seen as revenge, because it is not. The pussyfooting has to stop

But maybe sitting where Ramaphosa is, he will claim to be blindsided by the multiple crises he is fighting.

First, he is fighting personal multiple court cases and parliamentary investigations over the Phalaphala-dollars-in-the-sofa scandal that won’t go away.

Second, he is presiding over an ANC that is imploding so spectacularly, so publicly. The ANC’s failure to submit all its candidates’ names for the November elections is an indictment on the administration at Luthuli House, headed by “the boss” himself, secretary-general Fikile Mbalula.

So are the multiple court skirmishes in the Eastern Cape with its own members. The shock of these developments and embarrassment must also hit home for Ramaphosa, who has made the renewal of the ANC his mantra.

In these circumstances, personal survival and legacy issues may cloud his view on issues of more public concern, such as Mchunu’s continued retention in the cabinet, albeit as he sits at home twiddling his thumbs.

However, none of this justifies the absence of action by the president against Mchunu. He has to be cut loose before the police move in against him too as part of the overall Johnson case.

The police need not feel constrained that acting against Johnson could be seen as revenge, because it is not. The pussyfooting has to stop.

Just as Mkhwanazi took a leap of faith in July last year to warn us because it was the right thing to do, the police and the NPA should ensure Johnson and her handlers and aides are arraigned now.

The renewal of public faith in the criminal justice system deserves no less, right now.

• Tsedu is a former editor of the Sunday Times.