The panel assisting President Cyril Ramaphosa in the appointment of the National Director of Public Prosecutions (NDPP) on Friday quizzed former acting KwaZulu-Natal director of public prosecutions Advocate Simphiwe Mlotshwa who is vying for the top post at the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA).

"I think I'm credible, in the sense that the NPA values that the chairperson [Energy Minister Jeff Radebe] refers to, I've been religiously adhering to for 18 years of my stay within the National Prosecuting Authority."

"I think I'm credible because all the decisions that I took in the NPA, they have never been challenged. You will recall that credibility galvanizes one to be able to rely on the person. On that score, I would say I am a credible person, and one can be able to rely on me each time I have to make a decision," said Mlotshwa.

The Pietermaritzburg advocate, who said he left the NPA in 2015, was taken through his résumé, which shows that he has come a long way from his days as a cleaner at a panel-beating workshop in 1993.

Mlotshwa reportedly lost the KZN prosecutions boss job after he refused to bow to pressure to drop charges against senior African National Congress (ANC) leaders in the province in 2012.

The eight-member panel conducting the interviews at the Union Buildings in Pretoria was set up by Ramaphosa to assist him in finding South Africa's next NDPP - a post which has been vacant since the unceremonious departure of Shaun Abrahams.

After Mlotshwa, the panel is scheduled to interview the last candidate vying for the position, Advocate Shamila Batohi, another former director of public prosecutions in KwaZulu-Natal province. Batohi has been a senior legal advisor to the prosecutor at the International Criminal Court, in the Hague, since 2009.