Moira Campbell: Victimised Mkhwanazi should be protected

KwaZulu-Natal Police Commissioner General Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi should be protected. So says Moira Campbell, the joint interim leader at Corruption Watch. “…we are concerned about the victimisation of Lieutenant General Mkhwanazi….it took a lot for him to come forward…We must get to the bottom of this - and he should be protected in the process.” Meanwhile, Campbell has some hope that the Commission of Inquiry - appointed by President Cyril Ramaphosa to investigate allegations of underworld links between politicians, cops and crime lords - might be more effective than previous commissions of inquiry. “…the high level nature of these allegations will make it quite difficult to circumvent any kind of attempts to derail the commission”. She describes how Corruption Watch has “for a long time been concerned about the infiltration of criminal syndicates into police structures…at different levels”, and did make submissions to the Zondo Commission back in 2019 already. However, despite a recommendation in the Zondo Commission report that it should be investigated, that did not happen. “…we might have avoided such a situation if those investigations had begun to sort of unravel the criminal links…the fact that these allegations have come to light now, almost forces the hand of the government to actually address this. But, we’ve lost a lot of time, we've lost opportunities and… it's more than regrettable. It's actually a real failure on the part of our leadership.”