The spotlight will be on South Gauteng director of public prosecution Andrew Chauke when the case against the directors of NJM resumes in the Palm Ridge Magistrates’ Court on July 23.
The directors, Mark Smith, Alex Roditis, Vanessa Chungu, Guy Phillip le Roux, Raymond Crozier and Ronald Hoy will get to hear the outcome of their third bid to escape criminal prosecution.
They face fraud and corruption charges, among others, after they confessed to submitting a fraudulent BEE shareholding certificate to Eskom. They attempted to secure a tender by including a black woman as one of the owners to satisfy black empowerment regulations.
The accused have made representations to Chauke to withdraw the charges against them after his subordinates, Adv Pretty Mabunda and Adv Gideon Nkoana, rejected their representations.
The six accused were arrested and then released on R20 000 bail each when they appeared in the Palm Ridge Specialised Commercial Court last year.
They then made representations to Mabunda, requesting that the charges be withdrawn. Mabunda sneezed at that. They then went to her superior, Nkoana, who also rejected their request.
The men are hoping to strike it lucky the third time with Chauke, who is expected to make a final decision.
Before their arrest in December 2023, Chauke allegedly interfered in the case.
It was alleged that investigating officer Lt-Col Jabulani Dlamini arranged with the accused’s lawyer, Ian Small-Smith, for them to turn themselves in to police when he decided that this prosecution-led investigation had gathered enough evidence to warrant the arrest and prosecution.
But Chauke allegedly blocked their arrest. He allegedly also allowed them to submit their warning statements to the investigation officer. They would only be prosecuted after these statements were considered on or before February 29, 2024.
By allegedly doing so, Chauke overruled the decision already taken by his subordinate, prosecutor Adv Jacob Tloubatla, the investigation leader, without consulting him.
It is alleged that at the time, Chauke had not even seen the police docket and hence was unaware of the allegations against them.
“He decided to take the matter away from Tloubatla without talking to him,” said a cop close to the investigation. Then in February 2024, a new prosecutor, Mabunda, was appointed to the matter.
The accused submitted their warning statements. After their consideration, Mabunda concluded that the accused should be arrested and appear in court in October.
Later, the accused applied for the contents of the police docket to be provided to them. Thereafter, through their legal representatives, they submitted their representation, claiming the state did not have a case that could secure their convictions.
“It was Mabunda’s decision that she had enough evidence to secure the accused’s convictions and therefore declined to withdraw the charges.
“In their representations, the accused denied that they submitted a shareholders agreement to Eskom despite them having submitted that under oath in the answering affidavit, which they filed in the Gauteng High Court, Johannesburg, in a civil matter brought against them by one of the complainants in the current criminal case,” the deep throat said.
When they realised that the state had this affidavit and planned to use it as evidence against them, they submitted another set of representations, this time to Nkoana.
Nkoana reviewed the second set of representations and determined that the state had a strong case against them. But their lawyer asked for another chance to make representations, this time to Chauke.
The matter was then postponed to July 23 for Chauke to consider the representations.
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