Shamila Batohi, National Director of Public Prosecutions; (Photo credit: Gallo Images / Netwerk24 / Felix Dlangamandla)
Shamila Batohi, Director of the National Prosecuting Authority, publicly appealed to the president of the court to appoint judges with the necessary skills and experience to hear state expropriation cases.
“When you have a very complex case in court, I think it is very important that the judge assigned has the necessary experience,” she said after speaking in Cape Town on Monday night.
“We urge the presiding judge, who makes assignments of judges to take up particular cases, to take into account the highly complex and highly specialized nature of these cases when making these assignments; We urge that judges with the necessary expertise and skills be assigned to address these issues.”
Batohi further added: [National Prosecuting Authority]we put in place a prosecutor, like a deputy prosecutor, who has no experience in dealing with major state capture cases, can you imagine the outcry in this country?
“We need the best minds, skills and experience to tackle this issue, and we expect the same from the judiciary.”
It was an apparent reference to the fact that the Nulane Investment fraud, corruption and money laundering trial had been assigned to an acting judge at the Bloemfontein High Court.
In April last year, Acting Judge Nompumelelo Gusha granted immunity to two former Free State officials under Article 174. Nulane Investments and its directors Iqbal Sharma and Dinesh Patel; The Gupta family's Island Sight Investments and its financier Ronika Raghavan argued that there was no need to mount a defense because of a lack of evidence.
The eighth defendant, former Free State official Limakatso Murosi, also did not lodge an section 174 application but was also acquitted, and Gusha similarly found the state had failed to produce any part of the evidence against her. said.
In its application for a stay of appeal, the NPA argued that Mr Gusha mishandled the matter and committed nine serious errors of law, resulting in a serious error of justice.
She rejected the prosecution's appeal. The National Police Agency subsequently appealed to the Supreme Court of Appeals and is currently awaiting a hearing date.
The charges, like those in the Estina case, formed the basis of the United Arab Emirates' application to extradite Atul and Rajesh Gupta, which was rejected in April 2023. It was done.
In August, the Bloemfontein High Court ruled against the 16 defendants in the Estina case, citing undue delay.
The outcome of these trials, together with the termination of the commencement of a money laundering case against former Eskom chief executive Mashera Koko late last year due to undue delay, calls into question the country's ability to prosecute state-capture corruption. caused.
Batohi acknowledged on Monday that the state's lack of data-handling expertise stumbled in the Koko case. However, she also questioned the fact that it was later revealed that Judge Stanley Jacobs, who granted the immunity, had not disclosed his history of dealings with Eskom.
“In that particular case, the magistrate could have made one of several orders. “We need to ask,” she said in April, departing from the NPA's usual caution in criticizing court decisions.
“It is true that there were various orders. The most drastic proposals were made, and now we may understand why that was the case.”
Batohi said the role of the judiciary in state capture cases is important.
“Responding to state capture is not the NPA's priority. It is the government's priority,” she said at a lecture organized by Stellenbosch University and Freedom Under Law.
“As the third branch of government, we need to ask what the role of the judiciary is in carrying out the priorities of this government within its independent authority.
“We need the resolute determination of an independent judiciary to ensure that cases move quickly through the courts, ensuring a fair trial not only for the accused but also for victims and witnesses. Corruption is not a victimless crime. No. Our people are the victims.”
Batohi also said the Stalingrad defense strategy became widely applied, targeting defense attorneys who initiated frivolous interlocutory motions to delay corruption trials.
“Guilty pleas in complex corruption cases are rare, especially in an adversarial system like ours, with broad protections that are often exploited by those who are adept at delaying justice.”
Batohi said he understood the public pressure on the NPA to secure the conviction of the main culprits in the state power grab scandal, but said these crimes accounted for less than 1% of the crimes prosecuted by the NPA. emphasized.
“As well as state capture and corruption, we are also dealing with a second crisis, a second crisis of all other crimes in South Africa, ensuring justice for thousands of victims every day. ” she said.
Mr Batohi said prosecutors were mindful that South Africans live in constant fear of violent crime, with home invasions being the biggest factor in that fear.
He said prosecutors maintain a 77% conviction rate in prosecuting more than 3,000 murders a year, but this is not based on the percentage of murders committed, but rather on the amount of documentary evidence available as a result of police investigations. It added that the proportion of murder cases ready to be filed. court.
“It is clear that the work of the NPA is not well understood or appreciated. The National Police Agency is sleeping or sitting around doing nothing, as some cartoonist saw fit to depict. On the contrary, we have been active in combating the twin crises of violent crime and corruption in our country.”
She said the work was often carried out in “toxic and dangerous” environments.
“Painting the NPA with a negative brush and spreading a false, evidence-based and perhaps self-fulfilling narrative that the NPA is failing is a disservice to the fight for the rule of law in our country. I am.”
