Western Cape premier Alan Winde wants light to be shed on allegations made three years ago that senior provincial police officers are, or were, linked with organised crime and those responsible for the rampant gang violence in the province.
Judge Daniel Thulare made the allegations in a 2022 bail appeal judgment, where reference was made to the possible infiltration of the Western Cape SA Police Service (SAPS) leadership by elements of organised crime, specifically the 28s gang.
The allegations echo those made during the Madlanga commission of inquiry into criminality, political interference and corruption in the criminal justice system. The inquiry was established following the allegations made by KwaZulu-Natal police commissioner Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi of collusion and corruption among politicians and senior police officers.
In an executive statement in the Western Cape legislature on Thursday, Winde related the various attempts he had made since 2022 to get to the bottom of the allegations.
He noted that, “for years now, the national SAPS has been unwilling or unable to work with this government to solve the burning issue of gang-related crime that continues to devastate too many communities. The thought that this may be due to infiltration of the SAPS’ highest levels of decision-making by organised criminals is horrifying”.
He said the allegations pointed to what was “potentially one of the darkest hours of not just the Western Cape, but SA’s criminal justice system”.
Winde acknowledged there had been positive movement and engagements with acting police minister Firoz Cachalia, who had developed an updated anti-gang violence strategy.
The premier said decisive action was required to deal with gang-related violence, which affected too many residents in the province.
Winde rejected as untrue media reports that he and his government had been reluctant to fully investigate Judge Thulare’s allegations and recounted how his government had fought to have the matter properly investigated without success.
In October 2022 Winde submitted a complaint about the matter to the Western Cape Police Ombudsman who submitted a final report the following month. But because the criminal trial involving the 28s gang had not been concluded, the matter was sub judice and Winde resolved to comply with the ombudman’s third recommended option, which entailed awaiting the outcomes of ongoing parallel investigations led by the Independent Police Investigative Directorate (IPID) and the SAPS.
The IPID investigation began nearly two years later on October 1 2024 and it has still not provided an update.
Winde said he had sought to have senior leadership of the Western Cape SAPS subjected to lifestyle audits and offered those to be paid for by the provincial government, but that was refused by Western Cape police commissioner Lt-Gen Thembisile Patekile in March.
Winde noted the delays faced in that process had become “unacceptable and can no longer be tolerated”. The SAPS, Winde said, did not seem to have acted with the urgency the matter required.
That had prompted him to table a redacted version of the ombudsman’s report in the provincial legislature, something he had refrained from doing, he said, to demonstrate good faith with the SAPS and IPID, and to protect those involved with the investigation.
The report has been redacted to protect the identities of those involved, as in the original matter heard by Thulare no fewer than three witnesses had already been murdered.
Provincial police MEC Anroux Marais had also written to the chair of parliament’s police portfolio committee, Ian Cameron, to ask it to investigate the slow progress of the IPID investigation into judge Thulare’s comments.
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