Justice for victims of KwaZulu-Natal’s political killings was delayed for months after police minister Senzo Mchunu abruptly disbanded the province’s specialist task team, the Madlanga commission heard on Friday.
KZN director of public prosecutions head advocate Elaine Harrison told the commission there was no need for the minister to disband the task team on December 31 2024, because the team was working well in investigating political killings haunting the province.
Harrison was the fourth witness to appear before the commission of inquiry into criminality, political interference, and corruption in the criminal justice system.
She said after the disbandment some of the task team members left the province, which affected the prosecutions of cases.
The disbandment directive resulted in deputy national prosecutor Shadrack Sibiya withdrawing 121 dockets from KZN to the SA Police Service (SAPS) head office in Pretoria between March and April, which stalled arrests in murder investigations and resulted in prosecutions not effected for months.
The arrests were only made in August when the dockets were returned. Harrison said the executive decision essentially resulted in justice being delayed for families of victims.
The task team had its own ballistics experts and phone analysts who assisted in reports for speedy prosecutions, she said, but during the disbandment prosecution of cases on court rolls took a knock because they had to go through SAPS to get ballistics and phone analyst reports, which took longer.
“We have lost three months,” Harrison said.
The head prosecutor said she was in the dark for months and was never informed of the disestablishment. She said Lt-Gen Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi said nothing to her about the disbandment.
Harrison was part of the stakeholders involved in the development of NPA-dedicated prosecutors who worked with the task team, a strategy that was developed by the minister of police and justice and constitutional development in 2019 after concerns of slow prosecutions.
Evidence leader Matthew Chaskalson asked her what she would have said if the minister had consulted her about disbanding the task team. Harrison replied that she would have demotivated the disbandment of the task team because “it was working well”.
The team’s expertise was crucial, she said, with the 2026 local government elections approaching in a province plagued by political killings.
The commission will on Monday hear from crime intelligence boss Lt-Gen Dumisani Khumalo, whose testimony is expected to shed more light on political interference in the police service.
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