Former anti-corruption boss under under pressure

Par­lia­ment’s ad hoc com­mit­tee is expec­ted to decide on Thursday how to pro­ceed against former Invest­ig­at­ing Dir­ect­or­ate Against Cor­rup­tion (Idac) boss Andrea John­son. Chair­per­son Soviet Lekgan­yane told the Sunday Times that its final report and the testi­mony of all wit­nesses would be delib­er­ated at the meet­ing, after which an announce­ment would be made. Opposition Mkhonto we Sizwe Party members serving on the com­mit­tee have already indic­ated they intend lay­ing per­jury charges against John­son after it emerged she may have lied to Par­lia­ment. Johnson endured a a torrid time last week with new revelations that she was recorded telling Idac prosecutor Drushantha Ramsamy that the Madlanga Commission, which is probing criminal infiltration and political inteference in the criminal justice sector, was ‘going to make our names shit’, and suggested collusion to block Ramsamy from testifying. Johnson last week resigned from her position amid intense scrutiny of the directorate’s conduct before the commission.

John­son had told the com­mit­tee she was unaware that National Col­oured Con­gress MP Fadiel Adams, who sub­mit­ted a sec­tion 27 refer­ral state­ment to Idac, the first step towards an invest­ig­a­tion, had also filed a com­plaint with Police Min­is­ter Senzo Mchunu. However, her testi­mony before the Mad­langa Com­mis­sion revealed that this claim was inac­cur­ate. The Sunday Times notes that the com­mis­sion also heard evid­ence of dis­crep­an­cies between the dates and inform­a­tion presen­ted by John­son to Par­lia­ment and the ver­sion she later gave at the com­mis­sion on the same mat­ter. Senior Idac invest­ig­ator Mant­sha Raphesu told the com­mis­sion on Fri­day that, instead of present­ing Adams’ ori­ginal report, which called on Idac to invest­ig­ate alleged cor­rup­tion in Crime Intel­li­gence, John­son sub­mit­ted what he described as fab­ric­ated doc­u­ments. ‘When Andrea John­son was present­ing at ad hoc, there was a point where she indic­ated that the PKTT (Polit­ical Killings Task Team) was not part of the sec­tion 27 refer­ral. I was shocked because in sec­tion 27 that I saw, that inform­a­tion was there,’ Raphesu said.

The testimony raised further questions about how Idac investigations were initiated, overseen and recorded, particularly in matters involving high-ranking Crime Intelligence officials. However, the commission has stressed that it has not yet made any findings on the evidence presented. The Sunday Tribune reports that Johnson concluded several days of testimony with a number of significant concessions during questioning by commissioners. She accepted that it had been unnecessary to arrest Crime Intelligence head Lieutenant-General Dumisani Khumalo and other senior police officials in connection with Brigadier Dineo Mokwele’s appointment, agreeing that less intrusive legal measures could have been used. Commissioners also heard Johnson acknowledge that National Commissioner Fannie Masemola had been wrongly charged alongside accused linked to the controversial R360m Medicare24 contract after commission chair Justice Mbuyiseli Madlanga suggested the decision had unfairly associated him with corruption allegations.