Operation Dudula says it won't stop preventing foreign nationals from receiving healthcare at state facilities
Dabula said it was not just their organisation driving this action.
"You've seen some other political parties joining as well. We've seen community, you know, normal community members who are not affiliated to Operation Dudula doing the same task because they are troubled in their communities with long queues."
She insists South Africans should be prioritised.
"We are the taxpayers. These people, they don't pay tax. Some of them are employed and they don't even get payslips. You know, they are illegal. How are you going to pay tax when you are illegal in a country? So, South Africans must be prioritised. That's what we're fighting for. We can't have a South African that will battle to get medication, yet a foreigner is getting medication."
The deputy chairperson of the Johannesburg Migrants Advisory Panel is calling on law enforcement officials to intervene and has urged people to adhere to the law.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Daily Maverick
an hour ago
- Daily Maverick
SAPS commissioner accuses police minister of derailing probe into political killings
KwaZulu-Natal Police Commissioner Lieutenant General Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi has alleged that senior figures, including Police Minister Senzo Mchunu, undermined investigations into political killings and organised crime. Lieutenant General Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi, the KwaZulu-Natal police commissioner, on Sunday claimed that the disbandment of the Political Killings Task Team was orchestrated to shield politically connected members of a criminal syndicate from prosecution, with the assistance of Police Minister Senzo Mchunu. Mkhwanazi said, 'I can confirm before South Africans today that the investigation which these members were involved with in Gauteng has unmasked the syndicate, and this syndicate involves, amongst others, politicians who are currently serving in Parliament.' He said some syndicate members were in 'the South African Police Service, the metro police and Correctional Services. They include prosecutors in Gauteng province, the judiciary … and all these are controlled by the drug cartel and businesspeople in Gauteng. This act, of course, undermines the criminal justice system in this country.' In a presentation shared to accompany the briefing, Mkhwanazi outlined the allegations. The Political Killings Task Team was formed after the 2018 assassination of ANC activist Musawenkosi 'Qashana' Mchunu. Backed by a multi-agency presidential task force and praised for its prosecution-led, intelligence-driven strategy, the team had, by 2025, investigated more than 600 politically related dockets, arrested 436 suspects, and recovered 156 firearms, with at least 55 of them linked to political crimes. Convictions to date total over 1,800 years in prison across more than 100 cases. Daily Maverick reported that on 31 December 2024, Police Minister Mchunu issued a letter to National Police Commissioner Lieutenant General Fannie Masemola, requesting that the team be disbanded. The minister said the task team was no longer necessary because it did not add value to policing in the province, according to the SABC. Despite this instruction, Mkhwanazi said at the time he would continue the fight to ensure the task team was allowed to proceed with high-profile investigations. Mkhwanazi said members of the task team were working with detectives in Gauteng on possible cover-ups in murder cases in the province that involved senior police officers. The disbandment of the task team was followed by a series of internal memos from SAPS Crime Detection head Lieutenant General Shadrack Sibiya withdrawing 121 case dockets from the team without the approval of the national or provincial commissioners. These dockets have reportedly sat untouched at the SAPS head office ever since. WhatsApp messages Sunday's briefing included explosive revelations such as WhatsApp messages and screenshots allegedly sourced from the phone of accused businessman Vusimuzi 'Cat' Matlala, showing communication between Matlala, Minister Mchunu and a politically connected intermediary, Brown Mogotsi. The chats suggest knowledge of the task team's disbandment before it was made public, direct discussions of 'solutions' to investigations and apparent financial support for political campaigns and 8 January ANC events. Matlala was arrested by the task team in May and faces charges of attempted murder, conspiracy to commit murder and money laundering. Less than two weeks later, the Investigative Directorate Against Corruption moved to seize the task team's exhibits, including Matlala's cellphone, and arrested the team's project coordinator. One of the syndicate suspects arrested by the team, Katiso Molefe, was granted bail. The effect, Mkhwanazi said on Sunday, had been chilling, with the Gauteng investigations into organised crime 'compromised' and confidence in the State's willingness to prosecute politically connected suspects further eroded. The EFF expressed grave concern, saying the briefing laid bare 'the existence of a powerful, organised criminal syndicate operating at the highest levels of the South African state'. The EFF urged the chairperson on Parliament's Portfolio Committee on Police, Ian Cameron, to convene an urgent portfolio committee sitting for a briefing from Mchunu. Cameron said the DA had written to National Assembly Speaker Thoko Didiza for an urgent debate in Parliament on corruption within the SAPS. 'These disturbing allegations of corruption, political interference and malfeasance at the very top of South Africa's law enforcement and national security infrastructure must be investigated immediately,' said Cameron. 'The President of the republic, who is presently away, must also immediately respond to allegations against a Cabinet minister.' 'Great role model' On social media on Sunday, Eskom board chairperson Mteto Nyati called Mkhwanazi 'a great role model' and said his 'decision to speak out' was 'exemplary'. Build One South Africa (Bosa)said it was 'disturbed by the string of weighty revelations. Of particular concern is General Mkhwanazi's claim that the task team appointed to investigate police killings was deliberately sabotaged from within the South African Police Service (SAPS). If true, this fundamentally undermines the integrity of our criminal justice institutions and threatens public safety. 'His allegations implicate senior police officials, prosecutors, judges, members of Parliament and members of the executive in acts that sabotage law enforcement and enable political killings. 'These are the symptoms of a state in capture crisis, where criminal syndicates and corrupt politicians allegedly operate with impunity.' Bosa joined the growing calls for Mchunu, Mkhwanazi and others involved to urgently appear before Parliament. Mkhwanazi's briefing ended with a call to SAPS members to 'stand up and protect our people against this criminal syndicate', even as he confirmed a formal criminal investigation was under way into the apparent capture of parts of South Africa's criminal justice system. 'Despite all these challenges, we acknowledge and appreciate the resilience of the members of the Political Killings Task Team,' said Mkhwanazi. 'They remain operational, albeit with serious attempts to disrupt their work.' Daily Maverick reached out to Mchunu's spokesperson, Kamogelo Mogotsi, for comment and received a video of the minister saying: 'We have become aware of what General Mkhwanazi has been saying. I didn't have time to look at TV, but there are those statements that he has said. We will, in good time, apply our minds to those kinds of statements.' DM
Daily Maverick
6 hours ago
- Daily Maverick
Judge Dennis Davis blasts government over climate inaction, says courts alone can't save the planet
At a recent climate law discussion at Stellenbosch University, former judge Dennis Davis took aim at government inertia on both the environment and the economy, saying the real work lies not in the courts, but in politics. South Africa's climate crisis is not just about emissions – it's about accountability. And the courts, for all their power, cannot substitute for the political will of a government that has failed to rise to the challenge. This was the message delivered with characteristic candour by former judge Dennis Davis in a keynote address at Stellenbosch University's Faculty of Law on 28 June 2025. Speaking at a colloquium on climate change law and green finance, Davis gave a blistering critique of government policy, warning that while civil society and the judiciary have done their part to uphold constitutional rights, it is ultimately the legislature and the executive who must 'just do their job'. 'The South African growth story is nothing more than absolutely disastrous,' he said. He traced the country's failure to strike a suitable balance between economic growth and environmental protection to a deeper absence of political leadership – and urged a 'serious debate' on the kind of policy South Africa actually needs. Legal dimensions of sustainable development The event was jointly hosted by two research chairs in the faculty – the Chair in Urban Law and Sustainability Governance, held by Professor Anél du Plessis, and the Gys Steyn Chair in Financial Regulation, held by Professor Johann Scholtz. Both chairs underscore the university's growing focus on the legal dimensions of sustainable development. Introducing the keynote, Scholtz described Davis as uniquely qualified to speak on the subject – a jurist, scholar and former director of the Centre for Applied Legal Studies, who handed down landmark judgments on socioeconomic rights, including the seminal Grootboom decision in 2000, which confirmed that socioeconomic rights are not merely aspirational but legally enforceable. Constitutional prescience Davis opened with a reminder of South Africa's own legal promise – section 24 of the Constitution, which guarantees the right to an environment that is not harmful to health or wellbeing, and mandates protection of the environment for present and future generations. 'That was in 1996,' he said, 'and I'm not sure anyone drafting it then grasped the immensity of the challenge we face today.' Citing a 2023 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report, he highlighted the disproportionate toll of climate change on vulnerable populations. 'Between 2010 and 2020, human mortality from floods, droughts and storms was 15 times higher in highly vulnerable regions than in regions with very low vulnerability.' 'Rolls-Royce framework lacking traction' But recognising rights on paper is not the same as enforcing them. 'One of the great problems in South Africa,' Davis noted, 'is that we're very good at having Rolls-Royce regulatory proposals without the foggiest idea as to how they should be implemented, or what their traction is going to be in practice.' So where does that leave the courts? 'Lawfare' not enough Davis pointed to a series of landmark judgments in South Africa as reasons for hope. These decisions, he said, showed that section 24 was more than symbolic – it could be a tool for real change. But that tool had its limits. 'There's a significant limitation to the process of 'lawfare',' he said. 'As attractive as it may be for lawyers to march into court, relying on the judiciary alone will not suffice.' Civil society, he argued, had played an essential role. The NGOs who brought these cases were 'brave' and 'not prepared to shut up'. But their success only highlighted the failures elsewhere. Shell case 'a milestone' A case that looms large for Davis is Sustaining the Wild Coast, in which the courts found in 2022 that Shell's proposed seismic surveys for offshore gas deposits had been authorised without adequate consultation. The court's insistence on meaningful engagement with affected indigenous communities – in their own languages and cultural context – was, for Davis, a milestone in recognising both environmental and human rights. But he questioned the broader system that allowed such authorisations in the first place. 'To what extent are we talking about intergenerational justice? To what extent are we actually grappling with these issues in economic policy?' Deep divisions To illustrate the gap, Davis recounted his recent interview with Minister of Mineral and Petroleum Resources Gwede Mantashe for his television programme Judge for Yourself – a follow-on from his earlier Future Imperfect, the show that first made him a household name for probing some of South Africa's toughest policy questions. He argued that post-apartheid economic policy had consistently failed to address inequality and unemployment. Instead of inclusive growth, he said, the benefits of development had disproportionately flowed to a small elite, leaving the majority of South Africans 'not just historically disadvantaged but presently disadvantaged'. According to Davis, Mantashe defended South Africa's pursuit of fossil fuel projects, pointing out that the country's northern neighbour, Namibia, was forging ahead with offshore exploration. By Davis's account, Mantashe argued that if South Africa embraced similar projects, economic growth could have reached 3% or 4%, easing many of the concerns raised by environmental critics. What troubled Davis most was the minister's proposal for some kind of environmental panel – à la a similar tribunal in Namibia – to expedite approvals and sidestep litigation. 'That is now being considered by Cabinet,' Davis warned. 'It raises profound questions about the extent to which the executive is committed to the rights enshrined in section 24.' This exchange starkly illustrates the deep division between judicial expectations and executive priorities regarding climate action and economic development. 'Challenge political, not legal' Davis returned to the principle of intergenerational justice – and the need for politics, not just litigation, to uphold it. He praised the Deadly Air judgment in 2022, in which High Court Judge Colleen Collis compelled the government to improve air quality in Mpumalanga, where most of South Africa's coal-fired power stations are situated. Crucially, the ruling was upheld by the Supreme Court of Appeal in April 2025, with Justice Mahube Betty Molemela confirming that the Constitution could be invoked to protect future generations and that the state bore a positive duty to act. 'And that's the point,' Davis concluded. 'The real challenge is not legal. It's political.' If South Africa is serious about leaving its children 'a society that's worth living in', he said, it must adopt an economic policy that confronts inequality, poverty and environmental degradation together. 'Presently disadvantaged' 'We have failed to achieve a balance between green growth and the socioeconomic needs of an emerging economy. The vast majority of South Africans are not just historically disadvantaged – they're presently disadvantaged. The question is: what would an economic policy look like if we took these things seriously?' For now, at least, Davis's answer is clear: 'It's not for the judiciary to manage the process. It's for the legislature and the executive. The rest of us are just squealing at the margins.' DM Desmond Thompson is a freelance journalist.
The South African
8 hours ago
- The South African
Senzo Mchunu refutes KZN top cop Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi's claims
The Minister of Police Senzo Mchunu says he will never allow his integrity, that of the Ministry or the South African Police Service (SAPS) at large to be undermined by insinuations made without evidence or due processes from anyone. This comes after an explosive media briefing addressed by KwaZulu-Natal police commissioner Lieutenant General Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi on Sunday, 6 July. Earlier on Sunday, The South African reported that during the media briefing on Sunday, Mkhwanazi revealed that the political killings task team has uncovered a syndicate including senior politicians, senior police officials, metro police, officials in correctional services, prosecutors, and other influential businesspeople that is controlled by a drug cartel in Gauteng and KZN. Mkhwanazi also accused the minister of police of political interference in investigations, as he reportedly ordered the task team to be disbanded and the withdrawal of 120 case dockets. In response to Mkhwanazi's allegations, ministry of police spokesperson Kamogelo Mogotsi said they will be reviewing the provincial commissioner's statements and consider appropriate action. Mogotsi said all the statements made by Mkhwanazi in public require an urgent, thorough and transparent investigation, on a proper platform. 'The Minister of Police remains committed to upholding the rule of law, ensuring accountability within the SAPS, and serving the people of South Africa with integrity,' she said. In response to Mkhwanazi's allegations, various political parties, including the Democratic Alliance (DA) and ActionSA, have written to the Speaker of Parliament to request an urgent debate. 'The Commissioner's unprecedented claims, pointing to widespread criminal infiltration and corruption at the highest levels of the SAPS, including the Minister of Police, raises grave concerns about the integrity and functionality of the country's law enforcement leadership, and more critically the troubling national security threat this poses,' ActionSA said. Let us know by leaving a comment below, or send a WhatsApp to 060 011 021 1. Subscribe to The South African website's newsletters and follow us on WhatsApp, Facebook, X, and Bluesky for the latest news.
