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Independent Police Investigative Directorate (Ipid) investigations into the deaths of 149 people in KwaZulu-Natal at the hands of South African Police Service (SAPS) task teams found police killed some suspects without being attacked.Ipid KwaZulu-Natal investigations deputy director Len John told the Madlanga commission of inquiry on Wednesday that the directorate was investigating the deaths, which occurred between April 2023 and May 31 2026 at the hands of three task teams probing the illicit drug industry, cash-in-transit industry and taxi industry.“Since 2023, there has been a surge in extrajudicial killings, which Ipid has noted with great concern,” John said. “The merits of some of the cases will be discussed further to demonstrate to the commission the reasons Ipid believes that in certain instances, innocent persons may have been killed unlawfully.” John’s testimony touched a nerve in the growing public debate on the killing of suspects by police during operations in KwaZulu-Natal. The commission, established by President Cyril Ramaphosa to investigate the infiltration of the criminal justice system by corrupt elements, is not probing allegations of extrajudicial killings in KwaZulu-Natal, but John said his testimony was relevant to the inquiry because there was a heightened risk that criminal syndicates will influence task team members to kill their rivals. People killed are unarmedJohn said investigations have shown that while police justified shooting suspects by reporting that they were shot at first, the directorate found that in some instances, people who were killed were unarmed.“We have identified through our investigation that in these killings you will get a shooting where six people are shot and killed. When you do an investigation, you find only two firearms,” he said. “The police’s explanation all the time is that the deceased shot first at them before they could shoot. When we have investigated, we identified a few cases that actually contradict the version of the police.”While the task teams identified were under the command of Lt-Gen Deenadayalan Govender and Capt Pedro Rodrigues, John told the commission that KwaZulu-Natal provincial commissioner Lt-Gen Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi could explain the formation and operations of the teams.Mkhwanazi, as the first witness of the commission, is expected to return to the commission to answer to allegations made against him by witnesses. John said criminal syndicates in KwaZulu-Natal hijack houses when they go into hiding and kick the owners out.“If the police get wind that [suspects] are on the premises, they go and just shoot everybody; even the owner of the house gets shot.”John’s testimony questioned the basis of the police operations that result in fatalities. He told the commission that in most cases, the task team did not have proper case numbers when they were looking for the suspects. “In some cases, they cannot even give you the names of the deceased they shot. With our investigation, we believe the police are not doing proper investigation to arrest the suspect. They go out to kill the person; that is why we indicate extrajudicial,” he said. “We have cases before the director of public prosecution where we can prove the deceased has not shot at the police, whereas the police said they did.” John continues with testimony.Business Day
