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Winning the battle against corruption will be near impossible unless the staffing crisis in the prosecuting authority is urgently addressed

Anew decision on a corruption trial that almost collapsed illustrates the enormity of the task awaiting national director of public prosecutions Shamila Batohi.

Vuyo Zambodla, formerly a senior official of the Buffalo City metro, is facing charges related to corruption and tender fraud. He first appeared in the East London magistrate’s court in 2011 and the trial started the following year.

In March 2014, after the case had been running for about two years, the magistrate recused himself, saying he believed the accused was not getting a fair trial because of continual “bickering” between the prosecution and defence counsel. He was also concerned that the lengthy delays in prosecuting the trial could prejudice its fairness.

Further, he said the prosecutor’s cross-examination of Zambodla was so “irregular” that it was impossible for him (the magistrate) to evaluate Zambodla objectively as a witness, and he felt the only option was to stand down.

Following the magistrate’s decision, staff in the public prosecutions office in East London asked their deputy director what should be done next: should the magistrate’s decision be challenged in the high court or should the trial start again before a different magistrate?

By the end of May 2018, when he still had no clarity on what was to happen to his trial, Zambodla asked the high court to order a permanent stay of prosecution, saying the extensive delays were causing serious personal and financial prejudice.

Now, five years after the magistrate’s recusal, the high court has ruled that the prosecution must start again with a different presiding officer. However, the decision was touch and go. According to the judgment, much of the problem was caused by chaotic conditions

at the prosecutions office, making prompt and efficient handling of the matter impossible.

Deneshree Naicker, responsible for deciding whether to reinstitute the prosecution, explained the situation to the court in an affidavit.

Naicker was appointed head of the specialised commercial crimes unit in East London in September 2014. It seems her task soon became almost impossibly fraught.

Five prosecutors reported to her. Their workload was very heavy, with complex fraud and corruption matters from regional courts all over the province. Several subsequently resigned and their posts are still empty.

After her appointment in the Eastern Cape, Naicker was still responsible for some matters in Kwazulu-natal, where she had previously worked. She had to return there over several months in 2014/2015, while also working on the Zambodla case and deciding whether to take the magistrate’s recusal decision on review or start from scratch.

Then some administrative staff resigned and she had to take over their duties — answering calls, taking messages for prosecutors, dealing with the office fleet and submitting statistics — in addition to her own work on new and existing cases. She also became ill and spent some time on sick leave. By the time she returned, a pile of new cases had pushed Zambodla’s matter far down on the list of issues to be resolved.

Prosecution hampered

In Naicker’s view, Zambodla’s case involved relatively simple facts. Yet the chaotic conditions and understaffing problems in her office were so great they almost led to his prosecution being permanently stopped.

If conditions like those in Naicker’s office are duplicated around SA — and there is no suggestion that this is an exceptional situation — then there is a clear staffing crisis in the regional and local centres tasked with investigating and prosecuting commercial crime.

Zambodla’s case shows how this crisis hampers efficient prosecution of corruption, and can even lead to charges being dropped completely. Clearly, without prosecuting officers being given the resources they need to do their work, the fight against corruption is doomed.

Chaotic conditions at the prosecutions office made prompt and efficient handling of the matter impossible