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National Director of Public Prosecutions (NDPP) Menzi Simelane today presented in the National Assembly a strategic plan which radically restructures the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA). Its entire administrative division is to be incorporated with the Department of Justice, instead of bolstering the institutional independence of the NPA. This is the exact opposite of the trend with the courts, where independence is to be increased by placing the administration and management in the hands of the judges, under the leadership of the Chief Justice. Institutional, financial and administrative independence are some of the key tests set by the Constitutional Court for independent institutions.

In addition, Advocate Simelane's new organogram strikes us as a snakes and ladders game in which senior officers of the NPA could be sent slithering down the ladder. Special Directors who are currently heads of the Special Commercial Crimes Unit, the Priority Crimes Litigation Unit and the Sexual Offences Unit have disappeared from the organogram and will have "a small staffing complement and be special advisors to the NDPP/ Deputy NDPPs." Their areas of work will be coordinated at a level below the Directors of Public Prosecutions at Provincial level.

Adv Simelane denies that any demotion is intended or that any demotion has occurred in the ranks of Deputy Directors or Chief Prosecutors recently posted to Magistrates Courts to prosecute. He says that no complaint of demotion has been filed. The redeployments that caused shock waves and triggered PSA action have been reversed but the strategic plan makes it clear that "experience and expertise are [to be] channelled to the courts."

He insists that the new structure - which sees the provincial Attorneys-General "elevated" to the first reporting tier as members of Exco while the role of the Units is in our view diminished - is what the legislative framework requires. But the NPA Act created the current structure, which is now being radically changed with a high degree of centralisation in the NDPP's hands.

Adv Simelane did not directly answer our question about whether his instruction to Chief Protea Prosecutor Andre Lamprecht is not unlawful in view of the Criminal Procedure Act's section 60, which forbids bail when there is a likelihood that bail would disturb the public order. He answered by saying that every prosecutor is under the control and direction of the NDPP who has the power to intervene. "An intervention is informed by the law and is lawful," he said. We disagree.