Madlanga Commission praised for delivering results after Mogotsi’s arrest

University of Limpopo criminology and criminal justice professor Witness Maluleke said the Madlanga commission was the only commission that made sense.

“We have witnessed the inductions of various commissions without positive dividends; thus, the exercised arrests are encouraged. We should take a leaf from them, while hoping for more arrests to be made to act as a deterrent for others,” he said.

His comments come after the arrest of political fixer Brown Mogotsi.

Commission reveals corruption

Maluleke added that the root cause of criminality and corruption, under police leadership in collusion with organised criminals, was slowly revealing a deep crisis in the service.

Law expert Dr Llewelyn Curlewis said the arrests were a good start.

“I suppose everyone is completely comfortable that something is done regarding the corruption in our society, especially by those supposed to protect us and be the guardians of the law and the constitution,” he said.

However, Curlewis said the main issue remains an undisputed fact that there have been few successful prosecutions so far.

“It is one thing to identify perpetrators and even to arraign them before court, but as long as we do not see these thugs in orange overalls, we are chasing shadows at taxpayers’ expense without achieving the goals envisioned when creating these tribunals,” he said.

Fact-finding mission

Criminal law expert Cornelia van Graan said the commission was a fact-finding mission.

“The arrests following it may lead to prosecutions,” she said.

“All the evidence has to be reviewed again and proven beyond a reasonable doubt. At this stage, the public thinks justice is being done.”

Denial of charges

Mogotsi’s lawyer, Makau William Sekgatja, says they are looking into suing the state for malicious prosecution and unlawful arrest.

Mogotsi was arrested on Friday evening after appearing at the Madlanga Commission of Inquiry, where he spent hours refusing to answer questions by chief evidence leader Matthew Chaskalson, stating: “I’m not going to incriminate myself.” However, his arrest is not related to the commission.

The political fixer was arrested for allegedly faking his own murder attempt in Vosloorus, Ekurhuleni. Sekgatja told Newzroom Afrika on Saturday that Mogotsi could easily have been summoned to appear in court and that the arrest was unnecessary.

We will be investigating and our client is within his rights to go the civil route to sue for malicious prosecution as well as unlawful arrest,” he said.

“So, it is within his rights, and those are the things that we are going to investigate at a later stage because in circumstances of this nature and with a person of a high-profile nature as our client in this matter, strict methods could have been used to actually bring him before the court.”

Arrest was unnecessary

Mogotsi faces charges of defeating the ends of justice. His lawyer believes Mogotsi could have been subpoenaed to appear before the court, instead of a warrant of arrest being issued. Alternatively, they could have arranged a handover with the lawyers.

“They could have subpoenaed him to say on this day we need you to appear for this matter,” said Sekgatja.

“And if the subpoena is not possible, they could have even arranged with us to say we want your client to come on this particular day so that we can process him and take him to court in relation to this matter.”

Mogotsi to appear in court

Mogotsi has previously claimed he was hijacked and that an attempt had been made on his life. However, investigators now believe the incident was staged. Sekgatja said Mogotsi is willing to tell his side of the story in court and maintains he did not fake his own murder attempt.

“He maintains his innocence in relation to those charges and he feels that only the courts are going to be in a position to vindicate him in relation to those charges,” he added.

Mogotsi is expected to appear in court today, joining the long list of previous arrests to come from the commission, including 12 senior police officers – including top generals – businessman Vusimuzi “Cat” Matlala and his business associate James Murray, Sergeant Fannie Nkosi, Julius Mkhwanazi, Kagiso Lerutla and the suspects connected to the murder of Witness D, Marius van der Merwe.