An elite South African graft-busting unit is to be dissolved, the safety and security minister said on Tuesday in the latest episode in a struggle between the country's crime fighting agencies.
The unit, known as the Scorpions, was the investigating arm of the national prosecuting authority, and police had seen it as invading their turf.
CASES
The unit has been behind some high-profile cases including the prosecution of national police commissioner Jackie Selebi, who has temporarily stepped down, and the new leader of the African National Congress (ANC), Jacob Zuma.
"The Scorpions will be dissolved and the organized crime unit of the police will be phased out and a new amalgamated unit created,'' minister Charles Nqakula told parliament, the South African Press Association reported.
Nqakula did not say to whom the amalgamated unit would report and when it would be formed.
The spectacle of elite investigators fighting one another has left some South Africans wondering who is fighting crime in a country with more than 50 murders each day.
MERGER
Nqakula said that the merger would combine the "best experience" of the Scorpions and the police's unit and was part of a revamp of the criminal justice system, which would have organized crime as one of its main priorities.
"We need proper measures, better human and material resources to achieve our goals in the fight against all crime," he said.
The ANC decided at its December congress, which resoundingly elected Zuma over South African President Thabo Mbeki, that the unit would be dissolved by June.
ACCUSATIONS
The ANC claims that the unit has been exploited by the president to settle political scores and has accused prosecutors of using "Hollywood style" tactics against Zuma, who will be standing trial in August on charges of fraud, money laundering, corruption as well as racketeering.
Nqakula's announcement was met by outrage from opposition parties who see the move to dissolve the unit as an attempt by the ANC to assert its control over parliament -- and Mbeki.
"This announcement once again shows that the country is now run, not by parliament, but by those few in Luthuli House [ANC headquarters]," Democratic Alliance spokeswoman and legislator Dianne Kohler Barnard said.
People with missing teeth might be able to grow new ones, said Japanese dentists, who are testing a pioneering drug they hope will offer an alternative to dentures and implants. Unlike reptiles and fish, which usually replace their fangs on a regular basis, it is widely accepted that humans and most other mammals only grow two sets of teeth. However, hidden underneath our gums are the dormant buds of a third generation, said Katsu Takahashi, head of oral surgery at the Medical Research Institute Kitano Hospital in Osaka, Japan. His team launched clinical trials at Kyoto University Hospital in October, administering an experimental
IVY LEAGUE GRADUATE: Suspect Luigi Nicholas Mangione, whose grandfather was a self-made real-estate developer and philanthropist, had a life of privilege The man charged with murder in the killing of the CEO of UnitedHealthcare made it clear he was not going to make things easy on authorities, shouting unintelligibly and writhing in the grip of sheriff’s deputies as he was led into court and then objecting to being brought to New York to face trial. The displays of resistance on Tuesday were not expected to significantly delay legal proceedings for Luigi Nicholas Mangione, who was charged in last week’s Manhattan killing of Brian Thompson, the leader of the US’ largest medical insurance company. Little new information has come out about motivation,
NOTORIOUS JAIL: Even from a distance, prisoners maimed by torture, weakened by illness and emaciated by hunger, could be distinguished Armed men broke the bolts on the cell and the prisoners crept out: haggard, bewildered and scarcely believing that their years of torment in Syria’s most brutal jail were over. “What has happened?” asked one prisoner after another. “You are free, come out. It is over,” cried the voice of a man filming them on his telephone. “Bashar has gone. We have crushed him.” The dramatic liberation of Saydnaya prison came hours after rebels took the nearby capital, Damascus, having sent former Syrian president Bashar al-Assad fleeing after more than 13 years of civil war. In the video, dozens of
ROYAL TARGET: After Prince Andrew lost much of his income due to his friendship with Jeffrey Epstein, he became vulnerable to foreign agents, an author said British lawmakers failed to act on advice to tighten security laws that could have prevented an alleged Chinese spy from targeting Britain’s Prince Andrew, a former attorney general has said. Dominic Grieve, a former lawmaker who chaired the British Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC) until 2019, said ministers were advised five years ago to introduce laws to criminalize foreign agents, but failed to do so. Similar laws exist in the US and Australia. “We remain without an important weapon in our armory,” Grieve said. “We asked for [this law] in the context of the Russia inquiry report” — which accused the government
RSS