Case against Mapisa-Nqakula is strong — NPA

Court reserves judgment on speaker’s bid to block arrest

As speaker Nosiviwe MapisaNqakula sat among her global peers at a United Nations conference in New York on March 12, top of her mind would have been a text message she received the day before from a police investigator who told her that she had to appear in court the next day to face charges of corruption.

The NPA revealed in an affidavit to the court that a decision to prosecute MapisaNqakula for alleged corruption was made on March 10 upon completion of its investigations.

Eight days later, investigators raided her home where documents and a wig she allegedly received as a bribe were seized.

Mapisa-Nqakula is facing 12 counts of corruption, worth R4.5m, for allegedly soliciting and receiving bribes from a service provider while she was defence minister.

The NPA argued in the Pretoria high court yesterday that Mapisa-Nqakula’s application was part of her efforts to frustrate moves to bring her to court.

Advocate Makhosi Gwala SC argued that Mapisa-Nqakula’s application was an abuse of court processes.

“We could have gone and arrested [her] but we chose not to do that and we said let’s do it in a seamless way, which is less invasive,” Gwala said.

“All we want is so that the court can fix bail. The applicant wants to frustrate us in the performance of our statutory function.”

However, Mapisa-Nqakula’s advocate, Reg Willis SC, said the state was infringing on his client’s right to choose her own legal representative.

“If we were to allow that [choosing when she should be processed], we are going to have a huge problem,” Gwala said.

He said no-one could claim the right not to be arrested and that if that were to happen, the majority of South Africans would also say when and how they should be arrested.

Gwala stressed that MapisaNqakula should be processed, appear in court and be dealt with in terms of the law.

However, Willis argued that the NPA carried out the search and seizure at his client’s home without her lawyer being present.

He also accused the NPA of leaking information to the media regarding the case, which the NPA has strongly denied.

Mapisa-Nqakula’s other advocate, Graham KerrPhillips, argued that his client’s arrest would be unlawful because the NPA intended to use a Section 204 witness — an accused person who turns state witness.

An affidavit by deputy director of public prosecutions Bheki Manyathi reveals that they first made contact with Mapisa-Nqakula on March 8.

At the time, Mapisa-Nqakula had been travelling from France to the US and could not discuss the matter.

When she eventually spoke to lead investigator Dylan Perumal the following day, she was informed that a decision to prosecute her had been taken.

According to Manyathi, she told Perumal that she would send him her lawyer’s details for further communication.

On Monday, March 11, Perumal texted her saying she urgently needed to provide her lawyer’s details as the NPA needed to secure her appearance in court on Wednesday March 13.

At the time, Mapisa-Nqakula was leading a parliamentary delegation to the UN entity for gender equality and the empowerment of women (UNWomen).

What would follow are days of back-and-forth negotiations with her lawyer, Stephen May, which ultimately resulted in an application to interdict the police from arresting her.

In its affidavit, the NPA argued that Mapisa-Nqakula did not have a right not to be arrested.

“No such right exists in law. The case against the applicant is strong.

“On the basis of information available to the state, the threshold in terms of the provisions of Section 40 of the Criminal Procedure Act has been met,” the affidavit reads.

Manyathi said there was a prima facie case that warranted Mapisa-Nqakula’s prosecution, and that, in his letters, May repeatedly stated that the speaker was willing to co-operate with law enforcement, however, their conduct indicated otherwise.

“Given the doubt they are casting regarding the sufficiency of the state’s case, they are advised to desist from what appears to be delaying tactics and to co-operate with our proposed process of enrolment.

“In that instance, the process leading up to disclosure of the evidence at the appropriate stage will be expedited,” he said.

Manyathi details how Mapisa-Nqakula allegedly received the bribes between December 2016 until July 2019 in different locations in Gauteng.

Judgment has been reserved.