Former South African police minister links Simelane case delay to defence payments
Former South African police minister Nathi Nhleko told the Khampepe Commission that the South African Police Service's (SAPS) refusal to pay for the legal defence of the accused in the Nokuthula Simelane case directly affected the delay and effective discontinuation of the criminal prosecution. This was reported by Daily Maverick.
In 2016, four former members of the apartheid-era police criminal intelligence unit were charged in connection with the 1983 abduction, murder and disappearance of African National Congress courier Nokuthula Simelane. According to Nhleko, the case stalled after SAPS refused to fund the accused persons' legal defence costs.
Court ruling on costs
The accused approached the Pretoria High Court. Judge Cynthia Pretorius ruled that SAPS, as the successor to the former South African Police, had assumed its obligations and must pay reasonable legal defence costs. The police service did not appeal the ruling.
Nhleko acknowledged the consequences of the refusal to provide funding but denied his own involvement in making that decision. According to him, the issue of paying for legal services was administrative and operational and fell under the responsibility of designated SAPS officials and its legal division. He also stated that the national police commissioner has sole operational control over investigations, and ministerial interference in his work would have constituted unlawful political interference.
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The Nokuthula Simelane case
Simelane was a 23-year-old student and activist when she was abducted near the Carlton Centre in Johannesburg. According to the publication, she was held for two weeks in premises above police barracks in the Norwood area, after which she was taken to a private farm near Northam in what is now Limpopo province. Her remains have still not been found.
In 2016, Willem Helm Johannes Coetzee, Anton Pretorius and Frederick Mong were charged alongside Msebenzi Timothy Radebe. Coetzee, Pretorius and Mong had previously applied to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission for amnesty only for Simelane's abduction, not for her murder. Coetzee and Pretorius are now the only survivors. In 2024, Coetzee was found fit to stand trial after an examination at Weskoppies psychiatric hospital.
Andrew Lisk, an investigator from the former Scorpions unit, told the commission in February that the case against the accused had been fully prepared for trial. At the same time, the proceedings had already been halted in 2004, when then justice minister Brigitte Mabandla ordered the National Prosecuting Authority to freeze all cases related to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
