It’s South Africa‘s key anti-corruption unit, tasked with investigating and prosecuting high-profile corruption and commercial and financial crimes.
But the Investigating Directorate Against Corruption (IDAC) is facing scrutiny, with some questioning whether it’s equipped to tackle the country’s most complex corruption cases.
It is after allegations at the Madlanga Commission that IDAC head Advocate Andrea Johnson interfered in an investigation involving suspended Crime Intelligence Major-General Feroz Khan.
The commission has heard claims that Johnson told investigators not to pursue certain aspects of the case.
Civil society organisation Accountability Now is one group which has called for the IDAC to be disbanded.
“IDAC is simply a pale shadow of the Scorpions, which were closed down by a simple majority in Parliament,” says its director, Advocate Paul Hoffman.
Hoffman said IDAC’s biggest weakness is that it operates as a unit within the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA).
“IDAC is vulnerable to the same fate because of the manner in which Parliament has structured IDAC as a unit within the National Prosecuting Authority. It is just too vulnerable to dissolution at the instance of a simple majority which wishes to repeal the legislation. What we actually need is a body that is secure in tenure of office.”
Speaking on 702 on Thursday, Hoffman argued that what South Africa needs is an anti-corruption body which is independent of executive control, similar to a Chapter 9 institution.
“What we also need to understand is that the National Prosecuting Authority is not an independent body, and it has been so badly gutted by state capture that it will take years to recover from the ravages of the saboteurs deployed in its ranks to protect the corrupt. It’s operated as a program within the Department of Justice. It’s not independent,” said Hoffman.
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Public Interest SA founder and chairperson Tebogo Khaas agreed that IDAC’s current structure was problematic but stopped short of calling for it to be disbanded.
Instead, he says legislative changes should be made to give the unit independence.
“Let us remind ourselves what IDAC sought to replace or to plug. It was to plug the void left by the dissolution of the Scorpions.”
According to Khaas, it is not so much the institution but rather the people within the institution where the problems lie.
“What is needed is to make sure that it is reconfigured to work as envisaged by the Glenister judgment as an independent body.”
Khaas said removing IDAC from the NPA and restructuring it as a truly independent institution would improve its ability to investigate corruption without political influence.
“Have it off the NPA… and make sure that it is configured in a manner that it is as independent as intended.”
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