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2 days ago

Heated Trust Medium 65% #madlanga-commission #saps #political-killings-task-team #pktt #docket-transfer #disbandment #general-sabia #general-masimula #investigation-disruption #governance

Madlanga Commission quizzes Sabia on Political Killings Task Team disbandment and docket transfers

Podcast Briefing 2:45

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Key Strategic Points

  1. 1 Sabia insisted his implementation letter of 17 January 2025 (SS13) was based on Brigadier Lutoco's email (SS9) of 3 January 2025, but the Commission established that SS9 does not contain any instruction to 'implement' the PKTT disbandment, only to 'communicate' the deactivation and prepare a close-out report.
  2. 2 The National Commissioner's affidavit states he rejected Sabia's proposed disbandment plan on 14 January 2025 as irresponsible and requested an amended plan; Sabia presented another amended plan on 15 January which the National Commissioner also refused to sign, yet Sabia issued SS13 on 17 January without explicit written authorisation to implement.
  3. 3 Sabia directed that all dockets, including 17 court-enrolled cases, be transferred to General Cintumul, contradicting the 6 March and 27 March action plans approved by the Minister, which specified that court-enrolled dockets should remain with the PKTT and current investigating officers until case finalisation.
  4. 4 The Commission established that from 28 March 2025 when dockets arrived at head office until their return to KwaZulu-Natal in August 2025, no investigations were conducted on the 121 dockets; an 11-day inspection exercise (19–30 May) and subsequent audit by General Mepi's team were completed only on 92 of the 121 dockets, with a draft report dated 6 June 2025.
  5. 5 Sabia conceded that storing dockets in a centralised repository and reassigning investigators from the PKTT to other units would necessarily cause disruption to investigations, yet maintained this was unavoidable and part of standard police procedure.
  6. 6 The Commission found that the PKTT mandate was extended to include traditional leadership killings only on 16 April 2024; Colonel Kamalo testified that 50 traditional leadership dockets were received in late April 2024, yet Sabia's audit report classified 46 of 92 audited dockets as traditional leadership cases, suggesting minimal time for investigation before the dockets were removed.
  7. 7 The National Commissioner testified that he assigned the disbandment task to General Kumalo, not Sabia, and that when Sabia raised the issue of rejected dockets, the National Commissioner told him to 'let General Cibula use his discretion,' not to implement an immediate disbandment plan.
  8. 8 Sabia acknowledged that his April 2025 letter directing transfer of all dockets to General Cintumul contradicted the approved action plan regarding court-enrolled dockets, but justified this as his own decision based on his mandate as head of detectives to push for process completion and capacitate the murder and robbery unit.

Notable Quotes

“SS9 does not instruct you to implement the deactivation. It doesn't. On any construction, it doesn't. If that instruction was ever given by the national commissioner, it's contained somewhere else and you are free to refer us to that. But we can't keep doing this where you're insisting that the national commissioner told me to implement the deactivation and he did that in SS9. It doesn't.”

— Commissioner Baloy (Evidence Leader)

“I feel oppressed in a sense that this is an official process. It's not a private process. It's an official process coming from the minister to the national commissioner to me. We are all in it.”

— General Sabia (Deputy National Commissioner Crime Detection)

“I was however not satisfied with the proposed plan and informed the applicant that it would be irresponsible to summarily disband the test team and remove the case documents from them as it will have a detrimental effect on the investigation of the cases.”

— National Commissioner Masimula (from affidavit, read into record)

“What all I am I am seeking from you is do you accept on the face of SS9 that it doesn't contain an instruction to implement. It doesn't contain maybe let me simplify it. Do you accept and as I think you must that on the face of SS9 there are no words that read which is in your paragraph 71 there are no words that say implement the deactivation of the PKT.”

— Commissioner Kumalo (Chairperson)

“I didn't act on my own. We were with the minister together with the national commissioner when this plan was presented... the minister said this is partially approved but I'm concerned about the court cases because they could take 5 to 10 years to come.”

— General Sabia

“Do you accept that your instruction that courtgoing cases the courtgoing dockets must be transferred to head office contradicts bullet point 4 on page 372... You were acting contrary to this plan.”

— Commissioner Baloy

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