Hearing record
Day 11
Hearings resumed after the mid-week break, but the day was dominated by a media challenge from Daily Maverick and News24 to the Commission's plan to hear a week of witnesses in camera.
The day in brief
What you need to know
- The Commission returned to Bridget Mabandla Justice College in Tshwane after Lt-Gen Dumisani Khumalo's illness had interrupted proceedings.
- Daily Maverick and News24 challenged the Commission's decision to hold the week's hearings in camera to protect the identities of witnesses due to appear.
- Evidence leaders indicated the coming testimony would touch sensitive matters, including covert police operations and active investigations.
- The media outlets argued that closed sittings would imperil the integrity and open-justice character of the inquiry, and pressed for case-by-case determinations rather than a blanket closure.
- Khumalo, who had been giving evidence before the break, did not resume his testimony on the day.
- The dispute delayed substantive evidence again, with the Commission set to rule on the format of the protected testimony.
Full coverage
The day, in depth
Media challenge over closed hearings
As hearings resumed, Daily Maverick and News24 challenged the Commission's plan to hold the week's proceedings in camera to shield the identities of witnesses scheduled to appear. The outlets contended that closed sittings would undercut the open-justice principle and the public accountability the inquiry was meant to serve, while acknowledging that a case-by-case approach might offer a compromise.
Sensitive testimony flagged
Evidence leaders signalled that the witnesses to come would speak to sensitive matters, including covert police operations and investigations still under way, which they said justified protective measures. Lt-Gen Dumisani Khumalo, who had been in the chair before the break, did not resume his evidence, and the Commission moved to rule on how the protected testimony should be handled.
Our analysis
The bottom line
Day 11 crystallised a tension that runs through any inquiry into organised crime inside the state: the same secrecy that keeps a witness alive can also keep the public in the dark. The Commission's instinct to close the doors for a week collided with two newsrooms whose case rested on open justice, and the clash was not a distraction from the work but a test of how the inquiry would balance its two duties. Neither position was frivolous, which is precisely why it needed adjudication rather than assertion.
It is fair to note that the media challenge, whatever its merits, added a second delay on top of Khumalo's illness, and an inquiry that keeps losing sitting days to procedure risks fatiguing the public attention it depends on. At the same time, resolving the open-versus-protected question early and on the record arguably strengthened the process, since a compromise reached under scrutiny is harder to attack later. The substance of the allegations was not tested on the day; the ground rules for testing them were.
Analysis is the archive’s own comment on the public proceedings, grounded in the record above. It weighs the evidence and the process; questions of individual guilt are for the courts and the commission to decide. Everyone named is presumed innocent.
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Counsel, the panel and sources
On the panel
- Justice Mbuyiseli Madlanga (chairperson)