Human rights activist and KwaZulu Natal (KZN) Violence Monitor Dr Mary De Haas has lambasted the Parliamentary Ad hoc Committee after her appearance on Tuesday.
De Haas accused the Ad Hoc Committee for misdirecting her about what she should have prioritied when she appeared before it.
De Haas who sounded very agitated by the treatment by the members of the committee accused of them of gunning for her because she wrote a letter to Minister of Police Senzo Mchunu who is on special leave declaring the Political Killings Task Team to be disbanded.
“What really concerned me about parliament was that I have been asked what should be prioritied and I did that and there was no discussion about really urgent issues like the breakdown of policing in KwaZulu Natal, emails not working, some phones not working, some members not having petrol, not enough vehicles, this is what I’m getting from the different parts of police from the province.
“I would have thought that was the priority. I don’t know why they had to focus on the fact that I wrote a letter to the Minister because, when I mean when Mkhwanazi made that ridiculous and actually in terms of police regulations he should have gone to his national commander or to his commissioner Masemola (National Commissioner Luitenant General Fannie) to parliament or the president through Masemola not public, completely against the police regulations,” she said.
De Haas further explained her dissatisfaction towards KZN Commissioner Luitenant General Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi.
“When he made that announcement, he was saying that the task team was disbanded because of its work on this syndicate in Gauteng. What did it have to do with me? Why is parliament focusing on me? That is what I want to know. As I have said you, there was this thick dossier that was sent to the parliament committee and I said this is what you have to do urgently and you can do it but there were things that they needed to do urgently. They said they can do it but they have to push for the internal audit,” she said.
De Hass said that the dossier was submitted to the former Police Minister and Security Advisor for the Presidency Minister of Dr Sydney Mufumadi.
“They had to start by implementing civilian control to their intelligence services. Six years ago he chaired a panel about the equipping and lack of oversight of our intelligence agencies. Civilian control which initially was in place before the Zuma( presidency (Former President Jacob Zuma). Must be in legislation as soon as possible. It was only signed into law this year. A lot of it was the waste of time. They were getting at me just because I wrote a letter to Minister,” said De Haas.