NPA to review IDAC cases and expand lifestyle audits, spokesperson says

The National Prosecuting Authority will review cases handled by its Investigating Directorate Against Corruption to assess whether the available evidence supports prosecution, spokesperson Kaizer Kganyago has said.

Kganyago told The Citizen that NPA head Andy Mothibi had also asked the Special Investigating Unit to conduct lifestyle audits of 29 members of the authority’s management and executive committee. The audits are to extend to IDAC prosecutors and investigators, he said.

Mothibi made the request concerning NPA leadership after taking office in February. Kganyago said the wider review of IDAC matters was already under way internally and would be guided by evidence and the law, rather than by outside legal submissions.

He said prosecutors would withdraw charges where there was not enough evidence, while cases supported by prima facie evidence would proceed through the courts. A review does not, by itself, establish misconduct in any of the cases or against the officials whose finances may be audited.

Former IDAC head Andrea Johnson has resigned. Kganyago said she had been included in the leadership audit process but that the NPA could no longer enforce an audit of her after her departure.

The announcement follows the formal withdrawal of charges against National Police Commissioner Fannie Masemola on Tuesday, 22 September, in a matter linked to a police health-services tender. Asked whether Masemola was owed an apology, Kganyago said the NPA would wait for findings from the oversight judge and had not yet determined whether there had been deliberate misconduct.

Masemola has said he is ready to return to work. Any decision about his position is separate from the prosecution’s withdrawal of charges.