Jiba emerges and claims Zuma backing

The deputy head of the NPA, Nomgcobo Jiba, has refused to sign an acknowledgement of her receipt of a summons to appear in court. According to a report in The Times, she reportedly told her boss that she answers only to President Jacob Zuma. Jiba, who went AWOL earlier this week, met NPA head Mxolisi Nxasana, in Silverton, near Pretoria, yesterday. The report says Jiba apparently refused to explain her disappearance or explain why she had not answered Nxasana's phone calls. NPA spokesperson Velekhaya Mgobhozi confirmed that Jiba had refused to sign the summons. The summons requires Jiba to answer questions in court next month in connection with her alleged fabrication of elements of a document in which she certified that the NPA believed that sufficient evidence had been obtained by the police to warrant the prosecution for racketeering of the KZN head of the Hawks, Major-General Johan Booysen. Booysen was accused of heading a Durban police death squad. He was cleared of all criminal and departmental charges. An NPA source reportedly told the newspaper that the sequence of events had aroused suspicions among some of the authority's officers that Jiba had phoned Zuma after learning about the court summons, and that Zuma then phoned National Police Commissioner General Riah Phiyega. The source reportedly said Phiyega then phoned Nxasana and demanded to know why the NPA was ‘meddling’ in a police investigation. ‘It is clear political strings are being pulled,’ said the source. Police spokesperson Lieutenant-General Solomon Makgale dismissed these claims. He said national detective head Lieutenant-General Vinesh Moonoo told Phiyega that a summons had been issued. Mgobhozi said: ‘The NPA doesn't take instructions from the police. The NPA decides when the matter is ready for court.’

Full report in The Times