Whistleblower cop assaulted over SAPS’ R45m spy gear scandal
Key topics:
Whistleblower Kwinika was assaulted for exposing a R45m police grabber deal
SAPS spent millions on illegal or unusable spy gear, including IMSI-catchers
Labour Court ruled Kwinika’s expulsion unlawful, but he was still pushed out
Sign up for your early morning brew of the BizNews Insider to keep you up to speed with the content that matters. The newsletter will land in your inbox at 5:30am weekdays. Register here.
Support South Africa’s bastion of independent journalism, offering balanced insights on investments, business, and the political economy, by joining BizNews Premium. Register here.
If you prefer WhatsApp for updates, sign up to the BizNews channel here.
The auditorium doors will open for BNIC#2 on 10 September 2025 in Hermanus. For more information and tickets, click here.
Former South African Police Union president Lt-Col Mpho Kwinika says he was assaulted by fellow officers and removed from his post for his involvement in exposing the police’s R45-million IMSI-catcher deal.
Kwinika helped defend Brigadier Tiyani Hlungwani in 2019, who blew the whistle on the dubious transaction allegedly orchestrated to siphon funds to buy votes at the 2017 ANC conference.
Whistleblowers alleged that SAPS Crime Intelligence was on the verge of purchasing an IMSI-catcher at a price that had been inflated by over R35 million.
IMSI-catchers, or “grabbers”, are powerful eavesdropping devices masquerading as regular cellular towers that harvest data from every mobile device connected to them.
Speaking to the Sunday Times, Kwinika said he and the officers who exposed the deal were victimised.
However, his specific problems began after a 20 March 2019 memo submitted to President Cyril Ramaphosa and then police minister Bheki Cele in which he questioned the police commissioner’s fitness to hold office.
Kwinika had accused the national police commissioner at the time, Khehla Sitole, of “classifying documents in order to hide corruption”.
Sitole later clashed with the Independent Police Investigative Directorate (Ipid), which eventually opened a criminal case against him for allegedly obstructing a separate investigation.
That case was the assassination of Lt-Col Charl Kinnear, who was a detective and section commander in a Western Cape anti-gang unit.
In February 2022, three months after Ipid registered the criminal case, Ramaphosa terminated Sitole’s employment contract “by mutual agreement”.
However, Kwinika said the damage to him had already been done two years before when, on 27 March 2019, fellow officers brutally assaulted him.
They left him with three broken ribs, a broken hand, a damaged eardrum, and visually impaired in his left eye, he told the Sunday Times.
He was arrested, detained, and denied medical care because he and his friends allegedly caused a public disturbance. Police also accused him of resisting arrest.
Kwinika’s version of events differs: “I was grabbed out of my car. I just heard voetsek from nowhere, then the assault began while I was pinned to the ground, even when I said, ‘I am one of you!’”
According to a 2020 Labour Court ruling, the criminal charges against him were withdrawn, but he was still placed on special leave, recalled, and expelled by the South African Police Union (Sapu).
However, Judge André van Niekerk declared the Sapu national executive committee’s decisions unlawful and set them aside, and ordered that Kwinika be reinstated as a member and president.
Kwinika still faced disciplinary proceedings after this, and he said he was strong-armed out of the South African Police Service in 2021.
He says he is fighting to get his job back and wants to testify at the commission of inquiry into the recent allegations made by police commissioner Lt-Gen Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi.
Read more:
Sitole declined to comment on the story, saying he could not speak about police matters because he was not currently permitted to.
IMSI-catchers and the police in South Africa
The South African Police Service’s complex history with IMSI-catchers dates back at least a decade.
In August 2015, the Hawks arrested two men in a sting where a Welkom millionaire tried to sell an illegally-acquired grabber to a bank employee.
Reports at the time said the device was initially imported with the blessing of senior police officials to help an illegal cigarette gang gather intelligence about rivals.
The cigarette smugglers essentially wanted police permission to destroy rival syndicates and run a police-supported cigarette smuggling operation.
Court documents revealed that the businessman paid about R15 million for the grabber and bought a BMW X5 for R874,000.
He was reportedly told the initial buyer wanted the unlawful interception equipment to monitor crime syndicates trafficking in gold, cigarettes, and rhino horn.
However, the buyer failed to pay him for the device, leading him to look for another. The Hawks caught wind of the deal and posed as businessmen interested in acquiring the device.
In 2021, it emerged that SAPS Crime Intelligence had procured almost R112 million worth of equipment, including grabbers, that it couldn’t use because it hadn’t obtained the necessary clearances.
The police had reportedly spent R111,997,703 to acquire 13 grabbers, 15 surveillance drones, and 12 precise mobile location vehicles.
Citing an internal police memorandum, News24 reported that Crime Intelligence already had IMSI-catchers, but that these were outdated and limited to intercepting 3G signals.
Former justice minister Ronald Lamola gazetted a five-year exemption on 19 May 2023, allowing the police to use the surveillance equipment it had procured.
This article was first published by MyBroadband and is republished with permission