Johannesburg - The Independent Police Investigating Directorate's (Ipid) head of investigations Matthews Sesoko has told the Zondo commission that Werksmans Attorney report which led to his suspension was flawed.
Sesoko’s evidence largely corroborated former Ipid boss Robert McBride’s testimony in April over Nhleko’s unusual involvement in Ipid’s investigation into the rendition matter.
Sesoko worked along with another Ipid official Innocent Khuba who had been investigating the Zimbabwe rendition matter.
Dramat and former Gauteng Hawks head Shadrick Sibiya had been accused of unlawfully handing over Zimbabwean fugitives to the Zimbabwean police in 2010. The suspects later died in custody.
Sesoko said there were two reports on the case, an interim report compiled and signed Khuba and forwarded to the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) as a progress report and another final report which was signed off by him and McBride and later forwarded to the NPA and Nhleko.
The first report had found that Sibiya and Dramat should be charged while the second recommended that there was insufficient evidence to charge the two.
Dramat was later suspended in December 2014. Former police minister Nathi Nhleko placed McBride on suspension and appointed Werksmans to investigate the existence of the two reports.
The Ipid official said the Werksmans report was largely flawed as he had never been able to testify because he was admitted in a hospital for depression.
“The doctor gave me my medication with an instruction that I must go see a psychiatrist who had me admitted in a hospital for depression. I spent two weeks in the hospital. While that happened the disciplinary hearing continued. No matter how much they (my legal team) stated that I am in a hospital that was not taken into account,” Sesoko said.
Sesoko was later found guilty by Werksmans which recommended that he, McBride and Khuba be charged with fraud and defeating the ends of justice.
He was suspended in August 2015 and later reinstated.
He told the commission that if he and Khuba had found differently against Dramat and Sibiya then they would have never found themselves in the legal wrangling.
“It was clear that there was an orchestrated effort to put general Dramat in a bad light. I would say that had our report found wrongdoing and if we had manipulated the evidence and made a conclusion that General Dramat must be charged we would not have found ourselves in the situation that we did,” Sesoko said.