Joburg - United Democratic Movement (UDM) leader General Bantu Holomisa has called for National Director of Public Prosecutions (NDPP) head Shamila Batohi to resign over her dismal performance as the country’s public prosecutor.
Holomisa has since called for the establishment of a commission of inquiry into Batohi’s fitness to hold office and for her provisional suspension.
Batohi was appointed by President Cyril Ramaphosa in February 2019 to take over the NPA as the director of its public prosecutions.
Among the reasons cited by the UDM are the failure to prosecute state capture crimes, including the failure to extradite the Guptas from the United Arab Emirates and the Nulane case.
Holomisa said there had been public outcry and international embarrassment suffered by the country due to her incompetence.
“The public outcry and international embarrassment that South Africa has suffered due to the incompetence, incapacity and inefficiency of the National Prosecuting Authority of South Africa reflects the same on the NDPP. She has dismally failed to execute her duties and responsibilities as outlined in the Constitution in terms of Section 179(5).”
Holomisa said Batohi had not been able to show how far she had fulfilled her obligations since her appointment over four years ago.
“There is no evidence that advocate Batohi has done anything to fulfil her obligations as directed by the Constitution.
“The two recent judgments, one at the United Arab Emirates (UAE) Court and the other at the Bloemfontein High Court, provide overwhelming evidence that advocate Batohi did not comply with her constitutional obligations and failed to make the required interventions to ensure that policy directives are complied with,” Holomisa says in the letter.
He added that Batohi had remained uninterested in the developments related to the extradition case of the Gupta brothers until Minister of Justice and Correctional Services Ronald Lamola stepped in.
“It is even more embarrassing for South Africa to learn that it appears that advocate Batohi did not even know the date of the hearing in February until rudely awoken by Minister Lamola a couple of months after the judgment was handed down. In a normal democracy, she would have been summarily dismissed,” he said.
Attempts to get comment from the NPA were unsuccessful at the time of going to publicaT.
The Star