Monday, April 4, 2011

Lieutenant-General Richard Mdluli

Shock over top police spy’s arrest for murder....

April 1 2011

The arrest of Mdluli, who is accused of the murder of his ex-lover’s husband, Oupa Ramogibe, 12 years ago, as well as of sabotaging the case for more than a decade, has sent shock waves through the country’s state security fraternity.

The shock waves are not only around the arrest, but what the arrest means in terms of information Mdluli has possibly gathered on politicians, government officials, senior police officers, the country’s top businessmen and those within the intelligence community through illegal covert spying operations.

Mdluli, along with two other policemen, Warrant Officer Nkosana Ximba, 38, and court orderly Samuel Dlomo, 49, appeared yesterday in the Boksburg Magistrate’s Court on charges of

murder,
attempted murder,
conspiracy to murder,
three counts of kidnapping,
two counts of assault with intent to cause grievous bodily harm,
three intimidation charges and a charge relating to
defeating the ends of justice.

Nonkululeko Mbatha, national police commissioner General Bheki Cele’s spokeswoman, confirmed police were looking for a fourth suspect.

Nonkululeko Mbatha

Cele told MPs yesterday that Mdluli’s arrest warrant was linked to the 1999 murder case and not his alleged links to suspected crime kingpin Radovan Krejcir.

He would not give reasons why the case had taken so long to be brought to court.

The charge of defeating the ends of justice, according to National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) spokesman advocate Mthunzi Mhaga, relates to the period from when the murder was committed until now.

Mdluli’s arrest came less than a week after private security consultant Paul O’Sullivan announced that he was going all out to ensure that Mdluli and his subordinate, Major-General Joey Mabasa, were put behind bars.

Paul O'Sullivan

O’Sullivan has accused the pair of being involved with Krejcir, who gave himself up last week in connection with a multimillion-rand life insurance fraud scam and is being questioned over crime boss Cyril Beeka’s murder.

A source yesterday said:

“There is going to be a serious fallout from this. The seriousness of the arrest can be seen with the briefing that the president was given by the NPA head, advocate Menzi Simelane.