Lobby group, the Right2Know Campaign, has called for a clean-up of the State Security Agency (SSA) saying they failed to help avoid the recent unrest in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng.
President Cyril Ramaphosa addressed the nation on Friday night, saying that the unrest was pre-planned and orchestrated by individuals seeking to destroy the nation’s constitutional order.
The former Head of Counter-intelligence at the SSA, Thulani Dlomo, handed himself over to Durban police on Friday – following allegations that he is among those responsible for fuelling the chaos.
Dlomo has since been released.
R2K’s Interim Programme Coordinator Thami Nkosi says, “It points to the spectacular failure of our intelligence community. The SSA and Crime Intelligence, when you look at the press briefing they gave the other day with the joint security cluster, the truth is we don’t know what the plan is. It could have been prevented if we had a fully functional operation. I am of the opinion that if that had been working properly we would have been able to clamp down on them before it even happened. Clean up the mess that is the SSA and the institution.”
President Ramaphosa’s address on the violent outbreaks:
Ramaphosa says the government was poorly prepared for the unrest that rocked parts of the country.
He reiterated that government will bring to account those responsible for the mayhem. “We will spare no effort to bring those responsible to justice. And I repeat, we will spare no effort to bring those responsible to justice.”
He says clean-up operations, often including local people, are now underway at many looted malls and shops in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng.
“161 malls and shopping centres were attacked during the looting and violence in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng,” he says.
The president says the attacks were designed to collapse the state and dislodge the government, but have failed because of the resistance of ordinary people and the security forces.
#FreeJacobZuma campaign update:
Earlier, Zuma’s supporters, under the banner of #FreeJacobZuma campaign, gave government 14 days to respond to its list of demands, including the immediate release of the former president.
Zuma is currently serving a 15-month jail term for contempt of court after defying a Constitutional Court decision, ordering him to appear before the Commission of Inquiry into State Capture.
The campaign organisers claim that the protests and the accompanying destruction of property over the past few days were a result of the outpouring of anger from those supporting Zuma.
