Prosecutions boss fights for survival

National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) boss Advocate Shamila Batohi was facing calls for her head at the end of last week as she desperately attempted to fend off widespread criticism of recent NPA failings – even attempting to divert attention by announcing a second attempt to extradite the fugitive Gupta brothers from Dubai, being sought on state capture charges, notes Legalbrief. And Batohi has backtracked on her claims that the NPA has been 'infiltrated' after Justice Minister Mmamoloko Kubayi summoned her to a meeting. The NPA boss caused a stir last week when she said the NPA had been infiltrated by unscrupulous prosecutors working in cahoots with criminals to deliberately bungle cases. Kubayi told the Sunday Times that the claims had worried her so much that she summoned Batohi to an urgent meeting on Friday. She said that in the meeting Batohi backtracked on her claims of infiltration, telling her she had used the wrong word.

Kubayi said Batohi had explained that she had been inundated with allegations that cases, including high-profile ones, were being deliberately sabotaged. ‘But what she is worried about is allegations of prosecutors who are working with criminal networks to sabotage cases. So we would have to deal with it case by case. The Sunday Times notes that Kubayi said she told Batohi that she would speak to President Cyril Ramaphosa about her concerns with a view to possibly launching a wide-scale investigation into prosecutors who are accused of working with criminals to bungle cases. The Citizen reports that opposition party, the Economic Freedom Front, wants Batohi to appear before Parliament next week to give more details about allegations of rogue elements inside the NPA. Another opposition party, ActionSA, has called for Batohi to be removed following the latest defeat in a state capture prosecution. On Friday, ActionSA parliamentary leader Athol Trollip said the party called not only for Batohi’s removal as the NDPP, but a ‘full parliamentary inquiry’ into what they claim is the NPA’s ‘ongoing prosecutorial failures and the extent to which political interference has infected its operations’. 

Government of National Unity member, the Democratic Alliance (DA) has also entered the fray, saying it would write to Parliament’s Justice Committee so the NPA could ‘account for yet another unacceptable failure in prosecuting state capture cases’. On Friday, the party’s spokesperson on justice, Glynnis Breytenbach, said the DA would bring the issue to tomorrow’s Justice Committee meeting. Breytenbach, a former prosecutor, notes the NPA’s mistake ‘risks derailing accountability in yet another major case’. Breytenbach, however, dismissed calls for Batohi’s removal, notes the DM. ‘The National Director is not the problem at the NPA. While I think that she could possibly have done things differently, she is not doing a bad job, and the failures of the NPA are not, you know, attributable to her and her alone.’ 

Full report in The Citizen

Full Sunday Times report

Full Daily Maverick report