The calls for the National Director of Public Prosecution (NDPP), Advocate Shamila Batohi to be axed are growing, with ActionSA becoming the latest political party to add its voice .
After her axing, the Herman Mashaba led party wants a full parliamentary inquiry into the National Prosecuting Authority’s (NPA) ongoing prosecutorial failures and the extent to which political interference has infected its operations.
The party’s national chairperson, Michael Beaumont says the NPA has once again exposed its deep dysfunction, either through incompetence or wilful neglect, with the latest disgrace being the collapse of the asbestos corruption case involving former Free State Premier, Ace Magashule, due to the unlawful and irregular handling of the extradition of his former personal assistant, Moroadi Cholota.
He said this is not an isolated blunder, but part of a disturbing and entrenched pattern.
“The NPA has become a refuge for the politically connected, a place where accountability is avoided, justice is delayed and prosecutions collapse with shocking regularity. Under Shamila Batohi’s leadership, the NPA reels from one scandal to the next. South Africans are left wondering if these failures merely a result of incompetence, or is there a deliberate agenda to protect the corrupt,” he said.
He added that the NPA has failed the nation from the Phala Phala saga to the collapse of high-profile cases like Timothy Omotoso, Shepherd Bushiri and the Estina Dairy Projecta and the list of prosecutorial disasters grows longer by the day.
“Most damning is the NPA’s failure to secure the extradition of the Gupta brothers, nearly a decade after the Gupta Leaks shook the nation. In the most recent financial year, only 6 State Capture-related prosecutions were recorded, with a target of just 10 by 2027. This is an insult to the South African people, given the R500 billion in economic damage linked to State Capture. Despite lofty promises, there have been zero convictions connected to the Gupta Leaks revelations,” he added.
In an interview with eNCA this morning, Batohi said she is going nowhere, suggesting that the issues in the NPA are not about an individual and they cannot be solved by removing the fingered individuals.
