Mkhize instructs lawyers to write to watchdog IPID after being dragged into Babita Deokaran’s murder

Johannesburg – Embattled former Health Minister Zweli Mkhize has instructed his lawyers to write to police watchdog IPID to investigate circumstances under which his name was dragged into the murder of Babita Deokaran.

On Tuesday, one of the six men charged with murdering Deokaran claimed during court proceedings that he had been tortured by police to implicate Mkhize in what has been called a political hit.

Deokaran, chief director of financial accounting in the department, was gunned near her home in the South of Johannesburg after dropping her child at school in the morning.

She was a whistle-blower in the Special Investigating Unit’s probe into millions looted through the procurement of personal protective equipment (PPE).

“Dr Mkhize has instructed his lawyers to write to the Independent Police Independent Directorate to investigate the circumstances surrounding the extraction and acceptance into evidence of the reported ‘confession’ whose value could only have been to cause him political embarrassment,” he said in a statement.

“Dr Mkhize would like to take this opportunity to assure Ms Deokaran’s family and all South Africans who are still reeling from the trauma of this callous crime that he has absolutely nothing to do with it nor the alleged procurement irregularities which are believed to have driven it,” he added.

He said it should be remembered that the alleged procurement irregularities took place at a provincial level not where he was deployed as minister.

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