The head of the Investigating Directorate in the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA), Andrea Johnson, has confirmed to Parliament that they are meeting on Thursday to discuss the case of former Eskom CEO Matshela Koko after it was struck off the roll.
Johnson told the Standing Committee on Public Accounts that the case will be re-enrolled in court as soon as they receive two outstanding reports from specialists.
She said the case was struck off the roll because they could not get the two reports from a digital forensic expert and an auditor.
Deputy National Director of Public Prosecutions Rodney de Kock told Scopa that Johnson has explained what led to the decision of the court.
However, the NPA disagreed with the ruling of the court, and they believe another remedy could have been found instead of striking the matter off the court roll.
“On the matter of yesterday (on Tuesday), advocate Johnson has indicated some of the challenges. We disagree with the ruling of the magistrate in that particular matter. The law makes provision for other remedies, including postponing a matter for final conclusion of the work. One of the critical aspects the court needs to take into account is the seriousness and complexity of the case as well as the public interest in a particular matter. We just want to emphasise that, in our view, the case could have been dealt with differently; it didn’t need that kind of outcome.
“The NPA will do all in its power to ensure that case is dealt with appropriately. We will work with the ID to support the ID and to ensure that if there are any lessons in that particular area, we will take those lessons,” said De Kock.
He denied that they rush cases to court. However, there are challenges that arise even when the matter is already on the court roll because of the complexity of the case.
He said there was no need for the case to be struck off the roll.
But the NPA will support the ID in its work on the case.
Johnson said the Koko matter was in court in September last year and was postponed to February this year.
“With the Koko matter, the Koko matter was only enrolled on September 27, 2022, and appeared again in February. At the time, we indicated to the court that we had two reports that are outstanding, a digital forensic report and a financial auditor's report.
“That was postponed to September, and the court then said it would hold an inquiry because these are now delays. Unfortunately, the volume of the work we couldn’t correctly estimate to the time it would have been done and we also had to work through the procurement process of Treasury in procuring two specialised services, which is a digital forensic expert as well as the financial auditor for the two reports.
“That is how that matter was struck off the roll, safe to say that we are meeting tomorrow so that we get all our ducks in a row to make sure that we expedite those reports for the matter to be re-enrolled as soon as possible,” said Johnson.
She said the ID will meet on Thursday to discuss the case, and this would include re-enrolling it in court.
siyabonga.mkhwanazi@inl.co.za
Politics