Top cop removed from protection duties over Ramaphosa safety row – report

Lieutenant-General Samson Shitlabane, head of protection services for the president has been removed after two incidents that allegedly compromised President Cyril Ramaphosa’s safety.

According to a Sunday Times report, Shitlabane, who has since been transferred to another policing unit, is challenging his removal internally.

Ramaphosa’s security was allegedly first “compromised” during the African National Congress (ANC) Nasrec elective conference last year December.

The newspaper also reported last month that a fight between senior protection services members ended in charges of intimidation being laid against counter-assault team commander, Brigadier Mbulelo Mbiko by Lieutenant-Colonel Chantal Sias, who led the presidential convoy.

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The president’s security is now in the hands of Major-General Wally Rhoode, accused of mishandling the Phala Phala farm robbery case.

‘Two separate security lists’

The intensifying row between the top cops saw Shitlabane left out of the presidential security plans around the State of the Nation Address (Sona) in Cape Town last week.

There were two separate lists of officers placed on duty to guard the president and VIPs at Nasrec and for Sona – one compiled by Rhoode and the other by Shitlabane, according to the report.

Both groups were deployed to both venues. At Nasrec, more than 40 protection officers were involved.

Sources quoted by the Sunday Times said Shitlabane was transferred “because there was a concern that he started to remove some basic things which form part of the president’s minimum protection, raising suspicions.”

“This also included the fact that they did not want Wally [Rhoode] to go to Nasrec, but he went there forcefully.

“There was already a threat that had been detected against the president by armed men who were pretending to be part of the security detail of some of the ANC leaders who were going to Nasrec.”

This led Rhoode to form a contingency convoy team for Ramaphosa and Deputy President David Mabuza.

This caused the stand-off with Mbiko because the team was not on the original SAPS operational plan duty list, the publication reported.

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