Advocate Matric Luphondo.
Gallo Images / Phill Magakoe
- Matric Luphondo and Kebone Masange are on trial for allegedly bribing a prosecutor to make a criminal case go away.
- The court is currently hearing a trial within a trial on the admissibility of evidence obtained in an undercover operation.
- On Wednesday, the investigating officer was cross-examined about when the operation was authorised.
When was the undercover operation authorised to catch former Mpumalanga prosecutions boss Matric Luphondo allegedly paying a bribe to have a criminal case disappear?
This was the question which took centre stage in the Gauteng High Court in Pretoria on Wednesday, where Luphondo and his co-accused, former head of the Mpumalanga human settlements department, Kebone Masange, are on trial on charges of corruption.
The charges emanate from an undercover operation where Luphondo and Hawks official Ayanda Plaatjie allegedly bribed a senior prosecutor, advocate Andrew Mphaga, to withdraw a fraud and contravening the Immigration Act case against Masange.
Plaatjie died in 2021.
The court is currently hearing evidence in a trial within a trial as Luphondo has challenged the authorisation for the operation, the entrapment itself and the alleged evidence obtained.
The investigating officer, Colonel Silindile Ngcobo, was the State’s second witness in the trial within a trial.
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Ngcobo testified she had received a call from Deputy Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) advocate Vernon Nemaorani on 17 March 2021.
She met with Nemaorani and Mphaga, who relayed he had been bribed by Plaatjie to withdraw a criminal case against Masange.
Ngcobo said she registered an inquiry docket, and a verbal authorisation was given by Nemaorani for an operation to be conducted with Plaatjie being the target.
On 19 March 2021, she added she was called back to the DPP’s offices in Pretoria where Mphaga said he had been approached again to drop the criminal case against Masange, this time by Luphondo.
Ngcobo told the court another verbal authorisation was given to add Luphondo as a target, but there was no need for her to open another inquiry.
She said the application for the sting operation was later reduced to writing on 24 March 2021.
An honest mistake
During cross-examination, advocate Danie Dörfling SC pointed out in Ngcobo’s statement, she said the operation was registered and authorised on 23 March.
Ngcobo said it was a mistake.
Dörfling said Nemaorani also mentioned 23 March in his affidavit and chalked it down to a typing error, maintaining the operation was registered and authorised on 17 March.
Dörfling questioned that both Ngcobo and Nemaorani registered the date as 23 March.
“Was it mere coincidence,” Dörfling asked.
“From my side, it was an honest mistake,” Ngcobo responded.
Dörfling put it to the witness 23 March was likely the date the operation was authorised.
If this was the case, the sting was in operation before it was registered or authorised.
Alleged crimes
Luphondo and Masange have been charged with corruption, defeating the ends of justice and conspiracy to commit corruption.
It is alleged Luphondo and Plaatjie bribed Mphaga to withdraw a fraud and contravening the Immigration Act case against Masange.
Masange is accused of being in South Africa illegally and using fraudulent documents in his application for the head of department position at the human settlements department.
After Mphaga was approached, he allegedly told his supervisor, who authorised a sting operation against Plaatjie and later Luphondo.
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During this operation, Luphondo allegedly met up with the prosecutor and handed him an 18-year-old bottle of Glenfiddich whisky, valued at R1 550, and R5 000 in cash.
He allegedly also told the prosecutor there would be more.
Later, Plaatjie is said to have contacted the prosecutor, asking for a meeting in Pretoria, where he allegedly handed the prosecutor R28 000 in cash.
The trial continues.