Rhino poaching trial stalled – once again!
Case against accused rhino poaching kingpin delayed for 17th time
A NEW prosecutor has been appointed to deal with the case of alleged rhino poaching kingpin Dumisani Gwala and his co-accused.
The trial against Gwala was postponed for the 17th time on Monday when he appeared in the Ngwelezana Regional Court.
The appointment of a new prosecutor resulted in the case being postponed to May next year.
Activist Jamie Joseph of Saving the Wild questioned whether the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) was attempting to sabotage the case by replacing State Advocate Yuri Gangai on Friday with a local senior public prosecutor.
Joseph told the ZO she had evidence that a bribe was paid to influence the case in Gwala’s favour. This allegation is yet to be proven.
Joseph said this must be seen in the context of the rumoured intention of State Advocate Gangai bringing forward an application for the recusal of Magistrate Shandu on Monday.
PHOTO: Muzi Zincume
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In an email the Director of Public Prosecutions in KZN, Advocate Moipone Noko, noted that ‘new prosecutors, who are senior public prosecutors, have been allocated to this matter’.
‘This is for fair allocation of cases to other prosecutors. It is not cost effective to have a prosecutor travelling from Durban to the north coast to deal with a case that can be dealt with by senior and experienced prosecutors within the cluster where the matters appear,’ he said.
Joseph is unconvinced.
‘The NPA suddenly claiming they want to be ‘cost effective’ (at the risk of losing cases) is also questionable, as they have indicated that they still would like Mr Gangai to prosecute other rhino poaching cases in Zululand. So why only be ‘cost effective’ in this one specific case?
‘Keep in mind this entire case is built around allegations that there is a Zululand syndicate of corrupt magistrates and prosecutors protecting rhino poachers and kingpins,’ she said.
This year alone more than 200 rhinos have been poached in KZN.
At the time of his arrest in 2014, Gwala was believed to have been involved in about 80% of the illegal rhino horn trade in KZN.
Gwala, together with his co-accused Wiseman Makeba and Aubrey Dlamini, face a combined 10 charges relating to the illegal purchase and possession of rhino horn‚ and of resisting arrest.
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