Mdluli ‘too stressed’ to work
Committee to grill SAPS brass on intelligence saga
PARLIAMENT’S police oversight committee has called an urgent meeting for next week, when it expects acting national police commissioner Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi to explain exactly what is going on in the Richard Mdluli saga.
Committee chairwoman Sindi Chikunga voiced deep concern during a meeting of the committee yesterday over the “chaotic” situation and the “shenanigans” in the police service.
She said the department would be invited to brief the committee “on these matters”, probably next Wednesday.
She was also considering asking Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa to attend.
“The issues are seriously worrying. Seated here, we are not very sure whether we have a united management in the police,” Chikunga told MPs.
“We need a special meeting… to deal with it once and for all.
“Some of us who visit police stations have the hope that at least police stations are still doing their work, but we are not very sure whether they are receiving what the constitution refers to as managed and controlled policing.”
It appeared that all that was happening was police officers thinking “about ‘who am I going to fight and how am I going to fight… and how am I going to win’, and I think that is chaos”.
Mdluli is currently challenging his suspension from SUSPENDED police crime intelligence boss Lieutenant-General Richard Mdluli says he is ill and cannot work because his doctor has booked him off for stress and hypertension and told him he needs rest.
This emerged from an the SAPS for a third time.
His case is due to be heard in the Labour Court later this month.
Chikunga urged committee members to prepare for the meeting “in every way”.
She said several key developments had taken place since a previous briefing by the department in April. affidavit Mdluli filed in opposition to an application by Freedom Under Law for an order to stop Mdluli from performing any official duties, pending the outcome of an application to have criminal and disciplinary charges against him reinstated. – Sapa
“Since then we have got to know that the department intended to suspend General (Johan) Booysen (KwaZulu-Natal Hawks boss) and that he took the matter to the Labour Court, and that suspension was reversed.” In the Mdluli affair, she continued, the former crime intelligence boss had been suspended and then the decision had been reversed, leading to a “seriously worrying” situation.
A further concern, she said, were rumours of possible additional suspensions of other senior SAPS members, and of “some senior managers resigning and citing reasons for resignations that are worrying”.
Chikunga’s comments came as Mdluli was set to face the civil rights group Freedom Under Law in court yesterday. The group is calling on him to formally answer fraud, corruption and nepotism allegations.
Cope MP Mluleki George urged Chikunga to call on Mthethwa to join the department in accounting to the committee.
“We need some assurance from the minister that policing is happening in this country.”
DA police spokeswoman Dianne Kohler Barnard said the Mdluli saga had now descended into farce.
“To have a person in and out of his job six times is beyond outrageous and I am very fearful that, when the minister comes, we are not going to achieve much more than allowing him an opportunity to give excuses.”