The notion that the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) is doing nothing to prosecute state-capture and corruption cases is “both wrong and dangerous”, national director of public prosecutions Shamila Batohi said in parliament on Wednesday.
She said the NPA would not succumb to public or media pressure regarding the prosecution of these cases.
“We are one of the few prosecuting authorities across the world where we can say that we are prosecuting former ministers, the former secretary-general of the ruling party, the former president of the country and also some of the most powerful CEOs and private sector actors in the country.
“These cannot by any measure be regarded as small fish,” Batohi said in a briefing to parliament’s justice committee on the NPA’s 2022/2023 annual report.
“The NPA has made significant progress in delivering overall on its mandate to deal with state capture and corruption,” Batohi said.
“The reality is that while the wheels of justice move slowly in SA impunity no longer prevails, and those with dirty hands know that it is just a matter of time before that dreaded knock on the door will come.
“The NPA cannot and will not be rushed due to public or media pressure. This is when mistakes may happen which the NPA cannot afford. We will only proceed when there are reasonable prospects for successful prosecution.”
Batohi said that the findings of the Zondo commission of inquiry, which identified alleged corruption cases, had not provided a blueprint for successful prosecutions. Successful prosecution of corruption cases was complex and required an onerous standard of proof beyond a reasonable doubt.
Many cases under investigation in SA were the most difficult to prosecute even by global standards. They often involved multiple accused, multiple jurisdictions and complicated digital evidence.
Batohi acknowledged however that too many architects of state capture remained unaccountable, and there was a lot of work still to be done.
She told MPs that the NPA’s Investigating Directorate (ID), which is dedicated to the prosecution of high-profile corruption cases, declared 99 investigations and enrolled 34 cases involving 205 accused people.
The specialised commercial crime unit and the directors of public prosecutions in the regions had enrolled 78 cases involving 363 accused.
The Asset Forfeiture Unit (AFU) and its partners had secured freezing or preservation orders to the value of R14bn and recoveries to the value of R5,4bn had been made.
Batohi said that the NPA dealt with about 650,000 cases countrywide every year.
After a difficult trajectory she was confident that the strategy the NPA had adopted had placed it on the right path. “We are seeing positive results with each passing year,” she said.
Deputy national director of public prosecutions Anton du Plessis said that the Zondo commission released its report and recommendations only in June 2022 and the ID had made significant progress since then. Corruption cases often took five to six years to finalise.
NPA chief director of strategy management Salome Baloyi reported that in the 2022/2023 financial year convictions were achieved in 419 (364 in the previous year) complex commercial crime cases, 89 cases of money laundering and R495m was subject to forfeiture. The value of freezing orders obtained from corruption or related offences was R570m.
Deputy director of public prosecutions and head of the national prosecutions service Rodney De Kock reported that the NPA achieved an 87% conviction rate of government officials for specialised commercial crimes, a 94.4% conviction rate for organised crime cases and 92,9% for cyber crimes.
ensorl@businesslive.co.za
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