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Public protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane.
- The Gauteng DPP has made the decision to prosecute Busisiwe Mkhwebane Public Protector, according to the NPA.
- This comes after the civil society group Accountability Now filed perjury charges against her in August last year.
- She will appear in court in January 2021.
The director of the Gauteng Public Ministry has made the decision to prosecute Public Defender Busisiwe Mkhwebane for perjury, NPA spokesman Sipho Ngwema confirmed Tuesday.
“The NPA wishes to confirm that the DPP did in fact make the decision to prosecute after carefully evaluating the evidence presented by the Hawks. This is in line with prosecution policy and the law,” he said.
The NPA comment came after the leak of a subpoena, indictment and private correspondence between the Director of the Pretoria Public Prosecutor’s Office and the investigation team.
The case was opened by the nonprofit Accountability Now in August of last year.
The Hawks said in a statement Tuesday that they had received a subpoena, but did not name the public protector, but did state that the “incumbent” received a subpoena and was due to appear in Pretoria Magistrates Court on January 21, 2021.
“The citation contains three counts of perjury. [Hawks] he will not get involved in this matter further until the incumbent appears in court, “said spokesman Colonel Katlego Mogale.
READ | Falcons Confirm Inquiry into Public Protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane
News24 previously reported that it was investigating Mkhwebane after anti-corruption lobby group Accountability Now filed criminal charges of perjury and defeat for the purposes of justice following Constitutional Court findings.
The ConCourt judgment upheld the February 2018 Gauteng High Court decision that Mkhwebane would pay 15% of the Reserve Bank’s legal fees in the Absa / Bankorp review case.
It coincided with a lower court ruling that its entire Absa / Bankorp investigation was flawed and that it was not honest during its investigation.
the public protector, in a report published on June 19, 2017, had commissioned the Special Investigation Unit to recover R1.125bn in “embezzled public funds”, describing the funds as an “illegal gift” given to Bankorp by the Reserve Bank of South Africa in the 1980s.
Since Bankorp and other banks were later absorbed by Absa, Mkhwebane ruled that the funds be recovered from Absa.
Following the release of their report, the central bank, finance minister, Absa and the National Treasury instituted requests for review that set aside their directive that the SIU recover funds from Absa. These applications were later consolidated.
The North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria set aside Mkhwebane’s findings, citing a “reasonable apprehension of bias” in his work.
That court found that he had acted in bad faith and presented a “series of falsehoods” during the litigation, News24 reported.
READ | ConCourt Maintains Cost Order Against Mkhwebane, Rules She ‘Was Not Honest’ In Absa Investigation
Accountability Now director Paul Hoffman SC wrote in the Daily Maverick in August of last year that the indictment was based entirely on the binding findings of the Constitutional Court in the cost dispute between the Reserve Bank and the public protector.
