‘This is not football’ — Mkhwanazi rejects claims Cele backed Political Killings Task Team
KwaZulu-Natal Police Commissioner, Lt-General Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi, has dismissed any suggestion that former Police Minister Bheki Cele was a “supporter” of the Political Killings Task Team (PKTT).
“I wouldn’t say he was a supporter. This is no football team. This is the police work,” he said.
Mkhwanazi was testifying before Parliament’s ad hoc committee on Tuesday.
Responding to a question from Chief Evidence Leader, Advocate Norman Arendse SC, about whether Cele supported the work of the PKTT during his tenure, Mkhwanazi said: “The Minister of Police, together with other Ministers that were assigned by the President, they were quite satisfied with the work that he was doing. I wouldn’t say he was a supporter.
Mkhwanazi also provided detailed testimony about his interactions with Senzo Mchunu, the current and suspended Minister of Police, who was appointed following the 2024 general elections and the formation of the Government of National Unity (GNU).
He said that before Mchunu’s appointment, he had already been introduced to him at his private residence, in a meeting facilitated by Cedrick Nkabinde, who was unemployed at the time but later became Mchunu’s Chief of Staff.
“I was privileged to meet with him in his own house. We met, we drank coffee, and we got to know each other. That was it,” Mkhwanazi said. Asked about the nature of the meeting, Mkhwanazi explained: “There was nothing else. We just sat there and we talked general and from there we left.”
He said the meeting had no official purpose, and was arranged by Nkabinde, who “wanted to demonstrate to me that they are indeed close.”
Mkhwanazi also revealed that Nkabinde had earlier told him about how he and former IPID head Robert McBride had flown to Durban to meet with Mchunu , then Premier of KwaZulu-Natal, regarding a case involving the death of a person in KZN, allegedly linked to Mchunu’s bodyguards.
“The incident allegedly happened at the time when the minister was a Premier and there was a death of someone in KZN and the minister at the time was accused to have interfered with the destruction of an evidence, a crucial evidence that was there,” he said.
Mkhwanazi said this case, which fell under IPID’s mandate due to the alleged involvement of police officers, had drawn the two investigators into a closer relationship with Mchunu.
“It led into, to some degree, an act that the Premier at the time had done wrong. That’s what made them to be close to each other,” he said. “But as to the reason why they never arrested the Premier at the time, I don’t have the details.”
Mkhwanazi said he was still in the process of verifying the story, but noted that “one former chief of staff of the Minister of Police at the time” had recently confirmed that Nkabinde shared the same account with him.
When asked about Mchunu’s later appointment as Minister of Police, Mkhwanazi said he was not surprised. “I’m never surprised on any appointment. So it didn’t bother me. It’s the President who decides. So there’s no expectation, so therefore there’s no surprise,” he said.
He further revealed that Nkabinde told him he had been approached by Mchunu to take on the role of Chief of Staff before the minister was officially sworn in.
“He said the minister want him to be a chief of staff. He wants to appoint him as a chief of staff and he had no clue what is a chief of staff,” Mkhwanazi said. “He phoned me and he asked me, what does chief of staff do? Because he had no clue what’s the chief of staff.”
Mkhwanazi added: “My first was, the chief of staff does administration and I believe you are a policeman. I don’t know what are you going to deal with administration things.” At the time, he believed Mchunu was still in Water and Sanitation, and questioned Nkabinde’s suitability for such a post in that ministry.
“So if you’re going to give advice on ministerial issues of Water Affairs, I don’t know what you know about that business,” he said. He noted that the call from Nkabinde came “before the official announcement was made”, and that “it was in the evening when he phoned me.”
On Nkabinde’s background, Mkhwanazi explained that he had been a junior member of SAPS before joining IPID.
“He left the South African Police Service as a junior member, as an investigator, he was holding a junior rank. I think he was a non-commissioned officer, perhaps between the rank of sergeant and warrant officer, but I speak under correction,” he said.
He added that Nkabinde left SAPS for IPID for “greener pastures” and had worked there for years until his controversial departure.
“What I know is that there were issues that he was resigning and they were charging him departmentally. So there was a fight between him and management of IPID at the time,” Mkhwanazi testified.
He told the committee that Nkabinde had described his departure from IPID as being driven by ethical frustrations.
“His words to me was that he couldn’t stand the wrong that is happening at IPID, between his boss, Mr Robert McBride, together with a famous Paul O’Sullivan, and the current head of IDAC investigation, Advocate Matthew Sesoko, he was just not happy with how they were doing business at IPID at the time,” Mkhwanazi said.
He said there were also disciplinary charges pending against Nkabinde at the time. “There were issues that he was resigning and they were charging him departmentally. So there was a fight between him and management of IPID at the time.”
He emphasised that this was based on what Nkabinde had told him in personal conversations, and not on verified evidence: “Of course, it was not under oath.”
When asked about the nature of his relationship with Nkabinde, Mkhwanazi said it was largely professional, though they had become close through work-related discussions.
“He was a person that I was accounted to. I was talking to him more often. He would share a lot of things, especially with regard to the work he was doing at IPID,” he said.
“So the relationship between me and him was more of a colleague relationship we had,” Mkhwanazi said.
Although not previously a political figure, Mkhwanazi said he has recently observed Nkabinde wearing political party T-shirts: “He was not a politician at the time. Although of late, I see him wearing political party T-shirts, but he was not a politician at the time.”
hope.ntanzi@iol.co.za
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