ActionSA has begun preparing legal papers to challenge the decision of the Independent Police Investigating Directorate (IPID) to classify the investigation report into the conduct of the Presidential Protection Unit members relating to Phala Phala as “Top Secret”.
This decision follows an appeal filed by ActionSA last month, which IPID ignored in what has become a pattern of obfuscation. ActionSA began this process in April 2025 to secure the findings of its investigation, which were then subject to numerous delays, including claims by IPID that its e-mail system had been down.
With the Public Protector already deeming the conduct of the PPU members to constitute an improper and unauthorised investigation, rising to the level of maladministration and operating outside of their legal authority when they investigated a crime without registering an official police docket.
ActionSA’s legal papers will take a three-pronged approach. It will challenge the constitutionality of the Minimum Information Security Standards (MISS) Cabinet policy, which is the basis for how documents are classified. Furthermore, it will challenge the rationality of the decision to classify this report as Top Secret and ask the courts to compel IPID to hand over the report to ActionSA.
The MISS Policy is obscene in the wide-ranging powers it gives a large number of state officials to classify a report as Top Secret which, when tested against the constitutional requirement for transparency, will not hold muster. This is made worse by the policy’s wording, which allows a report to be deemed Top Secret if it “can seriously damage the operational relations between institutions”. It is ridiculous that a wide number of state officials are free to keep government reports out of public scrutiny if a report may offend another government institution.
However, it is the decision to deem IPID’s investigation report into Phala Phala as Top Secret that is likely to be looked upon unkindly by the courts, when only reports that meet the below criteria should be allowed to be deemed Top Secret:
- Can result in the declaration of war;
- Can lead to the discontinuation of diplomatic relations between states;
- Can seriously damage operational relations between institutions;
- Can disrupt the effective execution of information operational planning and/or plans.
In a response to a parliamentary question submitted by ActionSA, the Police Minister revealed that the basis for the decision to classify IPID’s investigation report was that it “can seriously damage the operational relations between institutions and/or can disrupt the effective execution of information operational planning and/or plans”.
The notion that IPID’s report may offend the Presidency or SAPS is not a good enough reason to keep this document from the South African people. Similarly, to claim that disclosing the report may disrupt operational planning is to imply an ongoing investigation that IPID will have to prove six years after the robbery.
The truth is that IPID’s report is the last beachhead in the fight against the abuses of power to protect the President from the events at Phala Phala. After a whitewashed Public Protector’s report and the SARB clearing the President of breaking exchange control laws, IPID’s report is the last opportunity to hold President Ramaphosa accountable. At the heart of this fight is the knowledge that those entrusted to protect the President were seized by the need to protect him from legal exposure more than they were seized by the need to investigate a crime.
It is clear that, in this Parliament, accountability will not come from a futile opposition with its house in disorder, and it certainly will not come from a GNU accounting for 70% of Parliament. Parties in the GNU, once in opposition, who used to speak publicly of the need to investigate these matters, have been silenced by blue lights and lavish international travel. Accountability will have to come from an unofficial opposition led by ActionSA, speaking for countless South Africans who want to live in a constitutional democracy where all South Africans are equal before the law.
ActionSA will continue to report progress in this case and will not rest until the truth in this matter is known to all South Africans.
ActionSA Prepares Legal Challenge to Unseal IPID’s Phala Phala Report
ActionSA has begun preparing legal papers to challenge the decision of the Independent Police Investigating Directorate (IPID) to classify the investigation report into the conduct of the Presidential Protection Unit members relating to Phala Phala as “Top Secret”.
This decision follows an appeal filed by ActionSA last month, which IPID ignored in what has become a pattern of obfuscation. ActionSA began this process in April 2025 to secure the findings of its investigation, which were then subject to numerous delays, including claims by IPID that its e-mail system had been down.
With the Public Protector already deeming the conduct of the PPU members to constitute an improper and unauthorised investigation, rising to the level of maladministration and operating outside of their legal authority when they investigated a crime without registering an official police docket.
ActionSA’s legal papers will take a three-pronged approach. It will challenge the constitutionality of the Minimum Information Security Standards (MISS) Cabinet policy, which is the basis for how documents are classified. Furthermore, it will challenge the rationality of the decision to classify this report as Top Secret and ask the courts to compel IPID to hand over the report to ActionSA.
The MISS Policy is obscene in the wide-ranging powers it gives a large number of state officials to classify a report as Top Secret which, when tested against the constitutional requirement for transparency, will not hold muster. This is made worse by the policy’s wording, which allows a report to be deemed Top Secret if it “can seriously damage the operational relations between institutions”. It is ridiculous that a wide number of state officials are free to keep government reports out of public scrutiny if a report may offend another government institution.
However, it is the decision to deem IPID’s investigation report into Phala Phala as Top Secret that is likely to be looked upon unkindly by the courts, when only reports that meet the below criteria should be allowed to be deemed Top Secret:
In a response to a parliamentary question submitted by ActionSA, the Police Minister revealed that the basis for the decision to classify IPID’s investigation report was that it “can seriously damage the operational relations between institutions and/or can disrupt the effective execution of information operational planning and/or plans”.
The notion that IPID’s report may offend the Presidency or SAPS is not a good enough reason to keep this document from the South African people. Similarly, to claim that disclosing the report may disrupt operational planning is to imply an ongoing investigation that IPID will have to prove six years after the robbery.
The truth is that IPID’s report is the last beachhead in the fight against the abuses of power to protect the President from the events at Phala Phala. After a whitewashed Public Protector’s report and the SARB clearing the President of breaking exchange control laws, IPID’s report is the last opportunity to hold President Ramaphosa accountable. At the heart of this fight is the knowledge that those entrusted to protect the President were seized by the need to protect him from legal exposure more than they were seized by the need to investigate a crime.
It is clear that, in this Parliament, accountability will not come from a futile opposition with its house in disorder, and it certainly will not come from a GNU accounting for 70% of Parliament. Parties in the GNU, once in opposition, who used to speak publicly of the need to investigate these matters, have been silenced by blue lights and lavish international travel. Accountability will have to come from an unofficial opposition led by ActionSA, speaking for countless South Africans who want to live in a constitutional democracy where all South Africans are equal before the law.
ActionSA will continue to report progress in this case and will not rest until the truth in this matter is known to all South Africans.