Parliament looks into top cops supporting Phiyega
Parliament’s portfolio committee on police is on Wednesday set to continue with its inquiry into the circumstances that led to the issuing of controversial media statements in support of the suspended National Police Commissioner General Riah Phiyega.
The statements, by the police’s Board of Commissioners and individual police top management members, in July this year, sparked a political outcry with senior police management hauled over the coals for stepping into the political arena.
The provincial commissioners and other senior officials were made to eat humble pie during an August sitting of the committee, with each having to make a public apology to MPs for issuing the statement.
The media statement supporting Phiyega was issued while a process to appoint a board of inquiry to look into her conduct during the 2012 Marikana massacre. which left 34 miners dead was being done by President Jacob Zuma.
Phiyega was eventually suspended by Zuma, pending the outcome of the inquiry.
In a statement on Tuesday, Parliament said: “The meeting will see Committee Members deliberating on the transcripts, recordings and minutes of the Magoebaskloof meeting which was attended by SAPS BOC (Board of Commissioners) on 15 and 16 July this year. The inquiry is held in terms of the National Assembly Rule 201.”