A power outage at the high court in Pretoria saw the corruption case against former crime intelligence boss Richard Mdluli being delayed again.
The case, which has been dragging on for over a decade, will now be heard on February 6 2023. Mdluli faces charges of fraud, corruption, and theft related to the police’s secret slush fund.
He is accused alongside former supply chain manager Heine Bernard and former financial officer of State Security Agency Solomon Lazurus.
Mdluli and his allies were keepers of state’s secret slush fund allocated to the crime intelligence by the National Treasury for the prevention of crime, which they allegedly abused during their time at the helm between 2008 and 2012.
The allegations include payments Mdluli made to fund private trips to China and Singapore, the private use of witness protection houses, the leasing out of his private residence to the state to pay for his bond, and the conversion of properties for personal use.
The case was postponed in September to allow Mdluli to respond to the pre-trial agenda and provide an update to the court on the status of the review application concerning his legal fees.
In August, the high court granted the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) an order to retain over R13-million worth of assets belonging to Mdluli and his allies.
Sindisiwe Seboka, spokesperson for the NPA’s investigating directorate, said at the time that Mdluli’s former and current wives, Theresa Lyons and Vusiwane Mdluli, John and Heena Appalsami (of Daez Trading, acting as letting agent), Barnard’s wife Juanita Barnard, and Lazarus’ wife Sandra Lazarus are also implicated.
“The restraint is premised on the fraud, theft, and corruption case reinstated by the state on 26 August 2020. The matter pertains to charges of gross abuse of the police crime intelligence slush fund, which ultimately benefited Richard Mdluli and his family,” said Seboka.
“They include payment of private trips to China and Singapore; private use of a witness protection house in Boksburg and conversion of this property for his personal use; the leasing out of Mdluli’s private townhouse at Gordon Villas in Gordons Bay as a safe house to the state and using the monthly rental to pay his bond; paying his financing costs owing on his private BMW through an intricate scheme to the detriment of the SAPS; coercing an SAPS supplier into giving Mdluli a special deal on the use and purchase price of a Honda Ballade; paying transfer costs to an attorney on the purchase of a house in Brackenfell, Cape Town, and having family members without adequate qualifications or experience appointed in crime intelligence, getting them on the payroll, paying their salaries, and providing them with motor vehicles and cellphones.”
Mdluli is currently on parole. He was sentenced to five years in prison in September 2020 after he was found guilty of kidnapping, assaulting and intimidating Oupa Ramogibe, his wife, and Mdluli’s former lover Tshidi Buthelezi in 1998.
Mdluli served a third of his sentence in prison before qualifying for a parole. The spokesperson for the Department of Correctional Services, Singabakho Nxumalo, said he qualified for parole because he “falls under the Phaahla judgment”.
“He qualified to be considered for parole placement after serving 1/3 of the sentence as he falls under the Phaahla judgment. His minimum detention period was on 28 May 2022,” said Nxumalo.
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