Exactly one year ago today, KwaZulu Natal Police Commissioner, Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi held a press conference that lead the country down a path to the dark underbelly of South Africa’s criminal justice system.
The Madlanga Commission continues to lift the lid on allegations surrounding major drug busts in South Africa.
Recent evidence has suggested that some Hawks investigations may have been undermined from within, fuelling concerns about corruption and organised crime networks operating with insider protection.
Former anti-gang unit commander and policing expert, Major General Jeremy Vearey spoke to Radio 786’s morning drive-time show, NRA in which several explosive revelations were made about Vearey’s own interaction with Major General Feroz Khan.
The tensions between the NPA’s Investigative Directorate Against Corruption, and the police have come to the fore through the suspensions of Police Commissioner, Fanie Masemola and Crime Intelligence boss Dumisani Khumalo. Former police detective, Jeremy Vearey has told Radio 786 that there must be more scrutiny on IDAC, as it appears to be targeting people associated with Mkhwanazi.
He has flagged an alleged cabal in the criminal justice system, especially through the targeting of Khumalo. On the issue of IDAC head, Andrea Johnson, Vearey questioned her links to suspended crime intelligence deputy head, Feroz Khan:
“And we’re talking about 2016 now. Khan introduced her [Andrea Johnson] to us detectives. And we were wondering, who is this person and what are they doing? And even if they were from the NPA at the time, it was highly irregular for them to be at such a sensitive national accounting conference where we explain our performance. So yes, you need to explain that association [between Feroz Khan and Andrea Johnson] because it certainly isn’t one that innocently emerges at the time in the quarters of normal bureaucratic relations between the NPA and ourselves [the police]. She [Johnson] was not that big at the time for such a meeting to be exposed to us [the police] in that particular way.”
Vearey also says that the IDAC boss must explain the appointment of her husband, Junaid Johnson to the crime intelligence directorate. This as he has been linked to the targeting of Crime Intelligence boss, Dumisani Khumalo:
“For the while, it would serve the country best in my opinion, if IDAC and whatever they’re busy with, they get suspended with all of the people there being stepped aside to some other terrain and somebody else does the work of IDAC at this moment to finalize some of these matters and not the implicated people.”
