Just deserts, which is the punishment a murderer deserves, will not be meted out to those charged with the murder of 31-year-old Katlego Bereng from his Mangaung prison cell, where he was incarcerated.
The National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) this week confirmed the withdrawal of murder charges against convicted murderer and rapist Thabo Bester, and his accomplices Dr Nandipha Magudumana and her father, Cornelius Sekeleni.
The prosecuting authority argues there is not, as things stand presently, any provable evidence that will enable the state to secure a conviction on a murder charge.
The trio of Bester, Magudumana and Sekeleni were initially charged with the murder of Bereng, the young man allegedly smuggled out of prison, killed, and burnt to ashes in Bester’s cell, ostensibly as a ruse to further, as we understand it, Bester’s alleged evil intentions to evade justice.
Now the NPA says that in the event of fresh evidence coming to light, the withdrawn charge could be reinstated.
We understand the legal intricate nature of this matter, and the need for the state to have watertight evidence to secure a conviction. Yet there can be no escaping the hard reality of glaring weaknesses in our prosecutorial investigative capacity. In fact, some legal experts and others have flagged this prosecutorial incapacitation.
Compounding this problem, though, is that in some instances matters related to a corrupt system within the NPA that stand in the way of successful prosecutions, have been flagged.
Our NPA continues to attract rogue and self-serving prosecutors, a matter that requires strong political will to eradicate.
But today as the funeral service to bury the remains of Katlego in Bloemfontein takes place, what justice is there to talk about?
Are there, in the immediate or in some hazy future, prospects that his parents, relatives or society will have a sense of satisfaction that Katlego did not die in vain – that in his grave he sleeps with the assurance that those responsible for his callous death did not escape unpunished?
That is what just deserts entail: to ensure that perpetrators of crime, whatever their social status, get punished for their crime.
We accept, without qualification, it would be a miscarriage of justice if our courts were to do a shoddy and uncertain job in carrying out a meticulous job to seek justice for Katlego and others in similar situations.
But we argue that to achieve the objective of fairness, equity and justice for those who die like Katlego, the onus is on the NPA and the entire criminal justice system to employ dedicated investigators and prosecutors not polluted by corruption.
Without such basic safeguards, when in the end the police, investigators and prosecutors, subvert the principle of the rule of law, and engage in acts of illegality, we will be left with no country but a mafia state, where life becomes a cheap commodity to be snuffed out for a few silver coins.
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