Cele acts like a spoiled child refusing to apologise for outburst while 130 murdered in Western Cape in one week

4 October 2023

This week, Minister of Police, Bheki Cele, told Parliament in no uncertain terms that he will refuse to obey their decision and apologise to activist Ian Cameron, for telling him to “shut up”, before having him forcibly removed from a community meeting.

The actions of the Minister are nothing more than that of a petty, spoiled child, who refuses to take accountability.

In terms of the ruling by the Joint Committee on Ethics and Members’ Interests in Parliament, the Minister had breached the Code of Ethical Conduct and the Committee recommended that he submits an apology in the National Assembly for his conduct towards Cameron.

The Minister has refused to simply apologise and will seek to take the decision on review, instead of focusing on crime – a job in which he is already failing miserably. His refusal comes on the back of 130 people murdered in the Western Cape alone in the last week of September.

His priorities are clearly elsewhere, but this comes as no surprise for Cele as his public image has always taken priority over fighting crime.

Whilst the Minister does have the right to take matters on review, the DA will ensure that no public money is used in unnecessary court proceedings and that the Minister personally accounts for every single Rand spent, as this has nothing to do with his duties as Police Minister. Similarly, the DA will also ensure that the precious resources of the State Attorney are not wasted in this trifling matter, and we hope that any court review brought will be thrown out with the contempt it deserves.

South Africa is in the grips of a bloodbath, where more murders occur than in war-torn countries. With the latest crime statistics, 74 people are murdered every day and we cannot have a Minister who is more interested in vanity than doing his job.

Issued by Okkie Terblanche, DA Shadow Deputy Minister of Police, 4 October 2023