Thanks to police bungling, a senior National Prosecuting Authority employee who was charged with corruption has only lost his job, and is still a free man. Qaanitah Hunter reflects on several recent cases as incompetence and corruption become commonplace in the criminal justice system.
I know a lot is happening in South Africa every day, making it difficult for us to keep track of what is happening in the news.
There's also a lot to be outraged about; it is justifiable that some things fall under the radar.
So allow me to share something that I read in the news on Sunday that has bothered me until now. I couldn't seem to shake off the pit it formed in my stomach, and the more I thought about it, the more worried I became.
City Press reported on Sunday that the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) had dismissed one of its senior employees for allegedly soliciting a bribe to have corruption charges dropped against former eThekwini mayor Zandile Gumede and another accused.
A politically linked corruption accused trying to bribe their way out of the case against them does not surprise me. That isn't the part that worried me.
What concerned me was the part of the story that noted that the NPA employee, Terence Joubert, was arrested on the spot by the Hawks, but that the charges against him were later dropped.
The court established that the police did not follow proper procedures when they set up a sting operation against him.
Joubert was found with R30 000 in his car in a sting operation in 2018.
Case thrown out
This was after the police received information that he had allegedly approached one of the accused and said that he could help them to have fraud, corruption and racketeering charges against them quashed.
But the magistrate in the matter threw the case out on the basis that the court must authorise a sting operation or an entrapment.
Also, the report noted that the money was not handled correctly, which rendered the entire sting unlawful.
Four years later, all that has come out of this matter is that Joubert lost his job. He is still a free man.
Also, the accused who bribed the NPA official is not facing any additional charges for trying to get the case to disappear.
If this does not show us how broken and incompetent our criminal justice system is, nothing else could.
READ | Siphamandla Zondi: Anti-corruption talk has become a tool of rhetoric. That needs to change
How is it normal for law enforcement officials to ruin a case of a corrupt official within the criminal justice system, who was caught red-handed soliciting a bribe?
If someone who is caught in the act was allowed to get away with it, imagine the precedent it sets for so many other corrupt officials in law enforcement.
This case gives us a full glimpse into how corruption and incompetence have gripped law enforcement.
I was reminded of the recent bizarre decision by the NPA to withdraw charges against 54 ex-military veterans who were televised holding Cabinet ministers hostage.
Special Task Force led the intervention
The NPA said they had to withdraw the case because the Special Task Force (STF) led the intervention. The STF is an elite police unit which has members who wear military fatigues and are trained in counter-terrorism and hostage situations.
The NPA also cited the manner in which the arrest was conducted, saying it "also complicated identification as everyone on the scene was arrested except for the hostages".
The hostage situation in October last year was so severe that the STF was called in to free the ministers. Those implicated were caught on camera, and some even spoke to the media from within the crime scene. Yet, the NPA said they would not have been able to prosecute the matter successfully.
READ | Case against military vets who allegedly held ministers hostage withdrawn
This surely led to finger-pointing between the police and the NPA in both circumstances about who should be held accountable for the case falling apart. However, it paints a scary reality about the state's ability to successfully prosecute crime even when criminals are caught in the act and televised.
It was no different in the July unrest when a member of the South African Tactical Response Team - or amaBarete - told me that most of the arrests they made during the looting were thrown out of court even though video footage implicated the accused.
The police officer blamed it on lazy, incompetent prosecutors who frustrate magistrates with their shoddy documents and cases. But when I asked an NPA official about it, he blamed incompetent police officers who circumvent the law and take shortcuts during arrests.
The ordinary citizen doesn't care about who in the law enforcement supply chain is to blame. We only care about the fact that someone can be caught with a bribe in his hand and not face the might of the law. If people who are caught on camera taking ministers hostage can get away with their crime, what hope do victims of kidnapping and other crimes have?
This cesspit of incompetence and corruption in the criminal justice system must come to an end.
It is simply not okay.
- Qaanitah Hunter is News24's associate editor of politics and opinions.
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