Axed trio ‘takeover victims Abrahams
Abrahams defends Zuma officials
The justice officials whose appointments to senior posts were reversed by President Cyril Ramaphosa were “victims of collateral damage”.
The justice officials whose appointments to senior posts were reversed by President Cyril Ramaphosa were “victims of collateral damage” in the takeover from Jacob Zuma, former prosecutions boss Shaun Abrahams says.
In response to court challenges by three justice officials against Ramaphosa’s decision to reverse their National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) appointments, Abrahams said he did not believe Ramaphosa could legally rescind the appointments “without resorting to the courts”.
Abrahams, whose appointment by Zuma was found to be invalid by the Constitutional Court, says the officials whose appointments were reversed, including that of former acting head of the Priority Crimes Litigation Unit, Torie Pretorius, were “treated unfairly”.
During his state of the nation address in February 2019, Ramaphosa made it clear that he was on a crusade to “clean up” the NPA, which has come under fire in multiple court cases and commissions over its alleged “capture” by pro-Zuma officials.
His office has defended his right to rescind Zuma’s NPA appointments, on the basis that Ramaphosa did not publicly or privately announce them. Presidency director-general Cassius Lubisi maintains Ramaphosa was “entitled to change his mind and ... to decide not to go ahead with, and give legal effect to, his predecessor’s decision”.
Abrahams contends that at “no stage during my two- to three-hour meeting with the president did he give any indication directly or indirectly that he was opposed to the appointments, or that he wished to have the appointments rescinded”.
But, according to Abrahams, the “president was under the misapprehension that the appointments were fast-tracked as a direct result of him having ascended to the position of presidency of the ANC and subsequently as the president of the country.
“I reassured him that this was not the case; that politics had no role to play in the recommendation and subsequent appointment of any of the appointees; that the appointment process commenced about June/July 2017; that all the appointees were career prosecutors; that each appointee excelled in their respective fields of expertise.”
Abrahams adds that he told Ramaphosa, “I had informed all the appointees of their respective appointments; that the appointees were waiting to be advised when to assume office ... and that I was merely waiting for the presidency’s media announcement of the appointments before they assumed office”.
But the announcement never came, prompting the court challenges Ramaphosa is facing.
Pretorius, whose decision to prosecute then finance minister Pravin Gordhan over the early retirement granted to former SA Revenue Service deputy commissioner Ivan Pillay was reversed by Abrahams two weeks after he made it, is adamant that Ramaphosa was not legally authorised “to revoke an appointment of a special director unilaterally in the manner which he has done”.
He wants the high court in Pretoria to rule that he was lawfully appointed by Zuma, and to set aside Ramaphosa’s revocation of his appointment.
Abrahams says he provided the officials now fighting those cases with copies of the respective signed presidential minutes and proclamations confirming their appointments and powers “to enable them to communicate directly with the ministry and the presidency on the inordinate delay and to assist them to enforce their rights and interests if they so wished”.