Fingers are being pointed at police minister Bheki Cele for failing, it is alleged, to sign off the budget to the police's 6,000-strong crime intelligence division ahead of the violence that followed the jailing of former president Jacob Zuma.
Cele is not the most attractive of characters, and blaming him for the subsequent intelligence failures might sit comfortably with many people. But Cele and the national police commissioner, Khehla Sitole, are barely on speaking terms, and while Sitole has about him a constant air of despair, Cele may not be the bad guy here.
Sitole was appointed to run the police by Zuma, at least partly on the advice of suspended ANC secretary-general Ace Magashule. Sitole was provincial police commissioner in the Free State when Magashule was premier there. But while Cele might now be in charge of the police, he can't discipline Sitole. Only Ramaphosa can. And he hasn't.
Not that there hasn't been reason. During the recent insurrection, the police under Sitole's command were almost entirely absent, something domestic and foreign investors, let alone the rest of us frightened citizens, are not going to forget any time soon.
What's more, it turns out that under Sitole, police procurement is less than optimum. The police ran short of rubber bullets this year after a contract to buy them at about R70 a round had to be cancelled. They normally cost around R14. There's still a shortage, I understand.
Just last year Cele had a near fit in Mpumalanga when he discovered that some 3,000 police trainees were unable to graduate because there were no bullets for their final firearms tests. It took another two months to complete the course.
Sitole, though, seems bulletproof, with Deputy President David "DD" Mabuza and his security adviser, Mulangi Mphego, supporting from the shadows. Mphego once ran crime intelligence under Thabo Mbeki but later drew close to Zuma.
The police ran short of rubber bullets this year after a contract to buy them at about R70 a round had to be cancelled
If Cele has been delinquent in making funds available to crime intelligence now, it remains to be proved. Sitole has made four transfers in and out of the top seat of crime intelligence since late last year. All of these were made without ministerial approval, which the rules require.
In January high court judge Norman Davis found Sitole and others had breached their duties as police officers, including in the procurement of spyware. A February bid to appeal was denied. Ramaphosa did nothing. Sitole has since approached the Supreme Court of Appeal.
Cele was eventually persuaded to approve Sitole's second appointment to crime intelligence in almost as many months, Lt-Gen Yolisa Mokgabudi, in an acting capacity.
Ramaphosa sits atop all of this as if it were normal. Mabuza is still in Russia after leaving almost a month ago for "a few days" of medical treatment. If you are of a conspiratorial bent you have to wonder. Was he supposed to return to a post-uprising SA the way the Ayatollah Khomeini flew from Paris to Tehran in February 1979?
Ramaphosa seems to live in the middle of a vast web of deceit and greed. He survives by doing as little as possible himself, but with his party now patently divided his only way out is surely a sacking of disloyal ministers and officials. Or maybe not. This is Ramaphosa we're talking about. Bitter experience says he may continue to do absolutely nothing.
I'm not too crazy about pushing the local government elections out to February next year from the planned October 27. It obviously suits some parties like the ANC and possibly the EFF which may be struggling for funds and/or cohesion, and annoys others like the DA, which are probably better
managed.
No doubt former deputy chief justice Dikgang Moseneke took seriously the request by the Electoral Commission of SA to look into the timing of the polls, given that voter registration is still to be done and that, while third wave Covid infections may have peaked, lockdown restrictions might make registration difficult and serve as points of viral spreading. But by October this third wave will have vanished.
And the December holidays, as per 2020, may trigger a fourth wave which would peak in February, the month suggested by Moseneke for the polls. It could be a real mess.
I must apologise to my former Daily Dispatch colleague, Charles Nqakula, for nearly killing him off in last week's column. A sprightly Charles called to tell me that while he had fallen ill he was now fine, in Durban of all places, and almost 80.
And yes, he had resigned earlier this year and, as reported, has not been replaced as Ramaphosa's security adviser.
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