Cops 'blocked Agliotti files'
2008-05-08 14:02
Johannesburg - The police deliberately blocked a Scorpions request for intelligence reports on drug kingpin Glen Agliotti, a close friend of police chief Jackie Selebi, the Ginwala Commission heard on Thursday.
The public hearings into whether suspended National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) head Vusi Pikoli is fit to hold office, continued in Johannesburg with Frank Chikane, the director general in the presidency, giving evidence.
Pikoli's lawyer Tim Bruinders said his client had written a memorandum to President Thabo Mbeki, indicating that he intended obtaining a search warrant for the files and acknowledging that it was a "drastic" step.
This was after three meetings with the president, meetings with the ministers of justice and defence and two memoranda to Mbeki and Justice Minister Brigitte Mabandla did not produce any results.
Bruinders told Chikane that the police had, from day one, "never intended" handing over copies of the documents.
Chikane replied that the police had "difficulties" in handing over the source files: "That is what they said to me."
Bruinders told the commission that the Scorpions had requested intelligence reports related to Agliotti and wanted the police's informants file pertaining to Agliotti.
The Scorpions also wanted video footage of Agliotti and Paul Stemmet, a businessman and police reservist to whom Selebi authorised a questionable R500 000 payment.
Mbeki bowed to increasing pressure in January to suspend Selebi on "extended leave of absence". Selebi was charged with corruption and defeating the ends of justice at the end of January.
Pikoli's lawyers are arguing that the criminal investigation into Selebi was the sole reason for his suspension.
Mbeki suspended Pikoli as the head of the National Prosecuting Authority on September 24 last year and Frene Ginwala, the former speaker of the National Assembly, was appointed on September 28 to head the inquiry.
At the time, Mbeki cited a breakdown in the relationship between Pikoli and the justice minister as the reason for the NPA head's suspension.
- SAPA