Africa-Press – South-Africa. The controversy surrounding the murder trial of former Bafana Bafana and Orlando Pirates captain Senzo Meyiwa has taken a new twist this week after former advocate Malesela Teffo opened a case of defeating the ends of justice against the police minister.Teffo claims that Police Minister Bheki Cele convened a special meeting in Cape Town in 2020 with top law enforcement officials. That meeting was intended to compromise the current court proceedings of the trial of the five men accused of murdering Meyiwa in 2014. The docket for that case is identified as Vosloorus case 636/10/2014.
Teffo’s affidavit, which was deposed to at the Sandton Police Station earlier this month, alleges that the meeting was convened by Cele from November 20 to 22 2020 at the parliamentary precinct.
It was held to ensure that the parallel docket – cited as Vosloorus 375/1/2019 – which implicates Meyiwa’s then lover Kelly Khumalo and six other people who were present when the footballer was shot at Khumalo’s mother’s house in Vosloorus on October 26 2014, should never see a day in court.
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Teffo’s statement alludes to the top officials who allegedly attended the meeting as being the lead investigator Colonel Bongani Gininda and the former director of National Prosecuting Authority spokesperson Nathi Mncube.
“I was accordingly informed by my source/s that the agenda of the meeting was to deliberate about compromising the proceedings in the case … It was allegedly agreed that accused number five [Sifiso Ntuli] would plead guilty to the murder of the deceased and, thereafter, implicate accused number one to four in the said murder.
“However, at the period of the meeting in November 2020, accused number five [Ntuli] was not sentenced [for other crimes], but he was already found guilty of more than five murders, whereby he confessed and pleaded guilty of the said murders of the political leaders in the area of KwaNongoma in KwaZulu-Natal,” reads his statement.
Police spokesperson Brigadier Athlenda Mathe said police were aware of the case being opened: “The matters related to the crime scene are currently being ventilated in court. We therefore cannot discuss a matter that is on the court roll.”
In his affidavit, Teffo said Ntuli had been arrested by Warrant Officer Meshack Makhubo and confessed that he was guilty of committing all the murders he was allegedly involved in, but not in Meyiwa’s murder.
Therefore, accused number five [Ntuli] was not supposed to have been part of the proceedings in the case of Vosloorus case 636/10/2014. The resolution to find the compromised presiding officer was left for two ministers, namely Police Minister Bheki Cele, and Justice and Correctional Services Minister Ronald Lamola, respectivelyTeffo said it was common cause to him that Cele was complicit in the matter.
“Mr Cele visited the Meyiwa family and told the deceased’s mother that Ms Kelly Khumalo was the mastermind in plotting the death of the deceased. The minister alleged that he was familiar with the contents of the case docket 636/10/2014.
“The minister of police was shown the contents of the case docket 636/10/2014 by the leading investigating officer, Brigadier Bongani Gininda,” Teffo wrote.
Justice and correctional services spokesperson Chrispin Phiri said Lamola was not aware of the cases: “We are not formally aware of this statement and/or the case. However, the minister stands ready to respond should the need arise. The allegation, if one can call it that, is incredible and slanderous,” Phiri said.
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In September, the controversial Teffo was struck off the roll of advocates after the Legal Practice Council received numerous complaints about his conduct.
The complaints included allegations of disrespectful and contemptuous behaviour in court, misleading the court, assault and the misappropriation of clients’ money. His appeal is pending.
In December, he opened a fraud case against the judges who had disbarred him.
The trial of the five men accused of murdering Meyiwa is scheduled to resume in May.
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