Witness

Superintendent Elmarie de Beer

Head of internal affairs, Johannesburg Metropolitan Police Department · Johannesburg

Testified

The officer whose job is to investigate the Johannesburg metro police from inside it, and the witness who opened the commission's JMPD strand. Superintendent Elmarie de Beer heads the JMPD's internal affairs unit. On Day 173, 15 September 2026, led by evidence leaders Advocate Thabang Pooe and Advocate Lee Segeels-Ncube, she described an alleged scheme in which JMPD officers use unofficial informants to identify businesses moving large sums of cash or trading in precious metals, then intercept the cash or the goods. Her central claim was that the arrangement does not stop at the metro police: per Eyewitness News, it 'typically involved collaboration between JMPD officers, SAPS members, Hawks members, and the ultimate buyer and the sellers'. She named Superintendent Phineas Manyama of the Tactical Response Unit, a decorated officer on the department's own account, as an implicated official who used departmental resources for his own benefit and who kept crime patrols out of particular parts of the city; Manyama retired in April 2026, as her unit was preparing disciplinary charges against him. She also told the panel that her own investigators are threatened and targeted, and that officers under investigation lodge grievances against the investigators to escape the underlying case. Her evidence is testimony, not a finding. Nobody she named has answered it on the public record, none of it has been tested in court, and all are presumed innocent.

Elmarie de Beerde BeerJMPDInternal AffairsTactical Response UnitMadlanga Commission

This profile summarises testimony and evidence given on the public record before the Madlanga Commission of Inquiry. It restates allegations as presented at the hearings and is not a finding of guilt, liability, or wrongdoing by any person.

Awaiting appearanceNo portrait on the public record yet

Key disclosures

Evidence and allegations

An interception scheme run through unofficial informants

Officers identify businesses holding cash or precious metals, then take the cash or the goods.

De Beer's evidence, per Eyewitness News, is that certain JMPD officers work with unofficial informants - sources who are not registered and whose handling is not recorded - to find businesses trading in goods including precious metals or moving large sums of cash. The officers then intercept either the cash or the goods for criminal purposes, using the appearance of lawful police action. She described it as a pattern across multiple cases rather than a single incident. It is structurally the same allegation the anonymous JMPD inspector known as Witness K put to the commission on 23 June 2026 about the Killarney precious-stones theft, where a falsified seizure form was used to make a robbery look like a seizure. The allegation is untested.

The reach beyond the metro police

On her evidence the arrangements involve SAPS and Hawks members and the buyers and sellers.

The single most consequential sentence of Day 173, per Eyewitness News, was de Beer's description of who is involved: 'So the conduct is not confined to JMPD based on the cases. It typically involved collaboration between JMPD officers, SAPS members, Hawks members, and the ultimate buyer and the sellers.' If it stands up, it places municipal policing inside the same network this commission has been examining at national level for more than a year, rather than alongside it. No court has determined any of it, and no person has been convicted on the basis of it.

Superintendent Phineas Manyama and the areas the patrols leave

A decorated TRU superintendent, named as keeping crime patrols out of certain parts of the city.

Per Eyewitness News, de Beer identified Superintendent Phineas Manyama of the Tactical Response Unit as an implicated officer who used departmental resources for his own benefit and prevented crime patrols from operating in parts of Johannesburg. Her account of the mechanism: 'There are certain areas where TRU members, as soon as they go into those areas, especially where the crime hotspots or the syndicates operate, as soon as JMPD TRU members enter the parameters of that specific area, they are being phoned and told, What are you doing there? Get out.' EWN's reporter on the day recorded that Manyama was a celebrated officer within the department and that he allegedly made life extremely difficult for JMPD members who did not follow his instruction to stand down. Manyama retired in April 2026, at the point at which de Beer's unit was preparing disciplinary charges against him. Manyama has not responded publicly, has been charged with nothing, and is presumed innocent.

A pursuit called off

TRU members chasing a black Ford Ranger were allegedly ordered to abandon it.

Per Bulletin, de Beer's statement described TRU officers pursuing a black Ford Ranger and calling for SAPS and air-wing assistance, and then being instructed by Manyama to abandon the pursuit. On her account the officers were afterwards confronted and told to return their vehicles and firearms. The incident has not been dated in the public reporting and the allegation is untested; Manyama has not answered it.

What happens to the investigators

Internal affairs officers are threatened, and grievances are used against them.

De Beer told the commission that internal affairs investigators are intimidated, and described the procedural route officers use against them, per Eyewitness News: 'The very same officers that we investigate and we charge would be the very same officers that will turn around and open up grievances in order to get away from whatever subject they are being investigated against. A certain number of our investigating officers were targeted, threatened.' She also described complainants who are afraid of the officers they are complaining about. Taken together the evidence describes an internal control function outmatched by the conduct it exists to control. This is an institutional account rather than an allegation against any named person.

Timeline

How the account unfolded

Apr 2026

Manyama retires

On de Beer's evidence, Superintendent Phineas Manyama of the Tactical Response Unit retires from the JMPD at the point at which her unit is preparing disciplinary charges against him.

15 Sep 2026

Opens the commission's JMPD strand

Day 173. De Beer gives evidence for the first time, led by Advocates Thabang Pooe and Lee Segeels-Ncube, describing the alleged interception scheme, naming Manyama, and telling the panel her investigators are threatened.

On the stand

Appears on 1 hearing day

  1. Day 17315 Sep 2026
So the conduct is not confined to JMPD based on the cases. It typically involved collaboration between JMPD officers, SAPS members, Hawks members, and the ultimate buyer and the sellers.
Superintendent Elmarie de Beer to the Madlanga Commission on Day 173, 15 September 2026, per Eyewitness News. Untested allegation; nobody named has answered it publicly and all are presumed innocent.