Mkhize denies involvement in Deokaran murder
Gauteng Department of Health official and whistleblower
Babita Deokaran was gunned down while
sitting in her car outside her home in Winchester Hills in August.
Former health minister Zweli Mkhize says he has learnt with shock that his name has now also been “dragged" into the case.
“It is with shock and sadness that Dr Zweli Mkhize has learned that his name has been dragged into the case of the men who were arrested in connection with the murder of Ms Babita Deokaran.”
This comes after one of the men accused of killing Deokaran, Phakamani Hadebe said that Mkhize was the mastermind behind the incident.
However, the accused who appeared in court on Tuesday alleged that he was beaten and forced by the police into implicating the former health minister.
“I would like to take this opportunity to assure Ms Deokaram’s family and all South Africans who are still reeling from the trauma of this callous crime that I had absolutely nothing to do with it nor the alleged procurement irregularities which are believed to have driven it,” said Mkhize in a statement released on Wednesday.
“It should be remembered that these alleged procurement irregularities took place at a provincial level, far away from the national sphere of government where he was deployed as a national Minister of Health.”
Deokaran was a key witness in a Special Investigating Unit probe into the R332-million PPE scandal at the Gauteng Health Department.
The accused, Hadebe, and his 6 other co-accused appeared in the Johannesburg Magistrate’s Court on Tuesday, to apply for bail.
Mkhize adds that his lawyers will write to the Independent Police Investigative Directorate (IPID) to investigate the allegations further.
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