By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
Eastern Cape premier Oscar Mabuyane is off the hook after the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) declined to prosecute him for alleged money laundering, fraud and corruption.
The decision follows an investigation by the Hawks into criminal activities against Mabuyane.
The investigation is related to a vehicle purchase and renovations to his home in the Eastern Cape.
The public protector’s report found that Mabuyane, who was the provincial head of economic development, environmental affairs and tourism at the time, together with MECs Weziwe Tikana and Babalo Madikizela “improperly benefited from the misuse of public funds”.
NPA regional spokesperson, Luxulo Tyali explains the rationale behind the decision.
“We can confirm that the decision has been taken by the director of Public Prosecutions Barry Madolo not to prosecute Mabuyane and others after careful consideration of evidence that was at the disposal of the prosecution. Following an investigation by the Hawks, a decision was taken not to prosecute because we felt that there was no winnable case.”
The African National Congress (ANC) in the province has welcomed this decision and believes this was a political witch hunt against Mabuyane.
Meanwhile Mabuyane also instituted a review of the decision to deregister him from the MAdmin course and of the Horizon Forensics report into his thesis. In the court documents, he denied using ghostwriters to write his thesis.
In an affidavit, Fort Hare Vice-Chancellor Sakhela Buhlungu supported the university’s opposition to Mabuyane’s review applications.
He stated that the Horizon Forensics report was never submitted to the university’s Senate and played no role in the decision to deregister Mabuyane. He said Mabuyane should not have registered in the first place as he was “in flagrant breach” of admission requirements for an MAdmin degree (he didn’t have an honours degree).
The university’s counsel, Ncumisa Mayosi and Eshed Cohen, wrote in their heads of argument filed at the court that Mabuyane took so long to review the decision to deregister him that his case should fail on those grounds alone. They argued that the fact that he did not have the requisite qualifications to register for an MAdmin degree should be the end of the matter.