WATCH | ‘PKTT set benchmark for better organised crime investigations’

The head of crime intelligence, Lt-Gen Dumisani Khumalo, says the traditional way the police do investigations is no longer suitable for investigating organised crimes.

As a result, there had been attempts to get teams of officers from across the country to learn from the political killings task team (PKTT), he said.

Testifying at the Madlanga commission on Tuesday, Khumalo said the PKTT had analysts who were effective and worked speedily.

“There was a time when provinces were requested to send a minimum of six members to sit with the PKTT and learn from them,” Khumalo said.

“In all our reports...we recommend that this methodology [be] used as a benchmark to try and change the way we are investigating crimes,” he said.

We recommend that this methodology [be] used as a benchmark to try and change the way we are investigating crimes.

—  Lt-Gen Dumisani Khumalo

Khumalo said challenges arose when the officers returned to implement what they had learnt, but their seniors failed to adopt the strategies, as they would not have been among those sent to learn from the PKTT.

Capt Maxwell Wanda, a former member of the PKTT, told the commission last week that after suspended police minister Senzo Mchunu dissolved the task team at the end of December last year, the analysts — who included a crime scene expert, ballistics expert and cellphone analyst, among others — were no longer used.

“[This], I think, [affects] the turnaround time of investigating the cases. They [the PKTT] were having everything in the palm of their hands,” he said.

Wanda said the analysts were able to give investigators crucial information within a day or two.

“[But] they are no longer able to process things fast, to be [as] effective as they used to be because part of the disciplines are no longer there,” he said.

When he disbanded the PKTT, Mchunu said the team’s services were no longer required because they were adding no value to the fight against crime.

However, in July, KwaZulu-Natal police commissioner Lt-Gen Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi alleged that the minister was influenced by criminal cartels to disband the PKTT, thinking that they were being investigated by them, while it was a Gauteng crime counterintelligence unit that was responsible for investigating the cartel.

Katiso “KT” Molefe and Vusimuzi “Cat” Matlala have since been identified as the cartel members that might have influenced Mchunu to disband the PKTT.

The cartel is alleged to deal in drug distribution, contract killings and cross-border hijackings, among other crimes.

Following Mkhwanazi’s allegations, President Cyril Ramaphosa suspended Mchunu and established the Madlanga commission to probe the veracity of the allegations.

The commission continues.

Sowetan