CCTV footage ‘confirms’ meeting between top cop and fraud suspect – report

Senior police management – including national police commissioner General Khehla Sitole – reportedly met with a police supplier late last year to allegedly hatch out a plan to defraud Crime Intelligence of funds to be used to buy votes at the ANC’s national elective conference in December at Nasrec, Johannesburg.

According to a EWN report, surveillance footage confirms that Sitole and two of his deputies, as well as former police ministerial adviser Bo Mbindwane and acting Crime Intelligence Divisional Commissioner Bhoyi Ngcobo met with the director of I-View Integrated Solutions, Inbanathan Kistiah, at the Courtyard Hotel in Pretoria on December 13.

Kistiah is reportedly being investigated by the Independent Police Investigative Directorate (Ipid) for fraud and tender corruption.

“Two days after Sitole and his senior management met with Kistiah, on 15 December, an Ipid investigator sent a letter to the general that dealt with the allegations against I-View. In the letter, which EWN has seen, Ipid stated that it had been made aware of an invoice for I-View, worth R45 million, which was being ‘pushed through at all costs’. It appears that, at the time the letter was sent, the police watchdog was unaware of the meeting which had taken place just days earlier,” the report stated.

The meeting was first exposed last month, and at the time all parties denied being part of a cash-for-votes scam. However, they did not confirm nor deny that there was a meeting between them, which is said to have happened a month after the Ipid and the inspector-general of intelligence had conducted raids at Kistiah’s office in Durban, including the Crime Intelligence head offices in Pretoria.

The raids reportedly took place after a tip-off that evidence in connection with a fraud and corruption investigation was being destroyed.

Police spokesperson Vishnu Naidoo declined to answer questions about the meeting to EWN. He said police would cooperate the Ipid investigation.

Kistiah also declined to answer any questions about the meeting, while Ipid spokesperson Moses Dlamini said the nature of the meeting between Kistiah and senior police management was of concern.

“Why would a service provider who is under investigation call police generals [to a meeting] and they attend, knowing full well that the service provider is under investigation by Ipid? Also, why would people who are not involved in police operations or procurement be discussing procurement with service providers?” Dlamini asked.

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