It is hard to see how President Cyril Ramaphosa can avoid an independent inquiry into serious allegations of political interference, corruption and criminality made by one of the country’s provincial police commissioners.
On Sunday, Lt-Gen Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi, the KwaZulu-Natal provincial police commissioner, accused police minister Senzo Mchunu of political interference in police operations, links with unscrupulous characters, disbanding a task team probing political killings and drug cartels, and brokering a peace meeting between Mkhwanazi and Lt-Gen Shadrack Sibiya, the deputy national commissioner responsible for crime detection.
Even more disturbing was a suggestion that Mchunu, one of Ramaphosa’s allies and key enforcers in KwaZulu-Natal, misled parliament by claiming not to know an individual named Brown Mogotsi. The minister later admitted to knowing him.
Without naming names, Mkhwanazi implicated prosecutors, judges, business people and police in working with organised criminal syndicates.
Mkhwanazi is not a nobody. He came through the special operations branch of the police and, before his appointment to head of KwaZulu-Natal police, he acted briefly as national police commissioner. In KwaZulu-Natal, which is known to export hitmen to other provinces in the country, he has taken criminals head-on and was making progress in investigating political killings before Sibiya allegedly took all the dockets to police headquarters in Pretoria.
His methods are not without controversy but are largely tolerated by the public, which is tired of living in fear of criminals. Most of his suspects end up meeting their maker during shoot-outs with the police.
National police commissioner Gen Fanie Masemola, who is apparently facing arrest, has not responded to Mkhwanazi’s claims, and Mchunu has dismissed them.
Ramaphosa, who is attending a Brics+ leaders’ summit in Brazil, has called for discipline, restraint and cool heads. He has promised to deal with the matter on his return.
Julius Malema’s EFF is threatening to open a criminal case against Mchunu for defeating the ends of justice. Other parties have called for an ad hoc parliamentary committee to probe the matter. That would be likely to turn this very serious issue into a political football.
What is clear, however, from Mkhwanazi’s disclosures is the dysfunction and distrust at the top of the police’s administrative and political leadership. This needs to be addressed urgently.
Since the dawn of our all-race democracy, only one national police commissioner has ever finished a term of office. The rest were sacked or left before the end of their terms. As well as digging their own professional graves through misconduct and criminality, most left after falling out with their political principals.
Mchunu inherited Masemola from Bheki Cele.
Even though national commissioners are — like directors-general — appointed by the president, their political line managers are police ministers. This is consequential. Until now, Ramaphosa has been resolute on two things: first, he needs stability in his cabinet so that it doesn’t replicate the instability in the local sphere of governance; and second, for his own political calculus within and outside his party, he has made clear that he won’t do major reshuffles this year.
This year is important for him: his key priority is to successfully host the G20 and not hand over to an empty chair. In persuading US President Donald Trump to attend the G20 summit in November, he has expended some of his capital in his party.
To replenish his political capital, he fired the DA’s Andrew Whitfield from his post as the deputy trade, industry & competition minister, but refrained from dismissing ANC deployees.
There is an established, but cumbersome, process of removing police commissioners. This will apply to both Mkhwanazi and Masemola.
However, there is no protocol to remove a police minister. This falls squarely in the province of the president. Ramaphosa cannot fudge his way out of this.
Given that Mkhwanazi has implicated the judiciary, Ramaphosa will have to look outside the ranks of serving judges. A retired judge, such as former deputy chief justice Dikgang Moseneke, might be Ramaphosa’s answer to probe Mkhwanazi’s allegations, while Mchunu is moved elsewhere.
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