I was painted ‘dangerous criminal’ – Matsheka
Mpho Mokwape | Monday August 29, 2022 06:35
Matsheka who has given the State a one-month notice to pay him the sum of P10,720 000 in general damages for among others unlawful arrest and unlawful detention says he will take legal action should the State fail to pay.
In a notice directed to the Attorney General dated August 19, 2022, Matsheka through his attorneys Bayford & Associates, says he was humiliated and his feelings injured when he was unlawfully arrested and an impression was made to the public that he was a dangerous criminal.
“The arrest was effected without warrant on the suspicion that I have committed the offence of murder when the DIS officers did not have reasonable cause to believe that I have committed the alleged offence,” he said.
The legislator believes the DIS officers did not have the powers to effect the arrest in terms of the Intelligence and Security Service Act. He says that in terms of the Intelligence and Security Service Act, an officer or support staff authorised on behalf by the Director-General of DIS was only empowered, without warrant, to arrest a person if he or she reasonably suspects that the person has committed or was about to commit an offence provided for in the Act. The notice explained that the offence of murder was not under the Act therefore the officers had no right to subject him to such humiliation of unlawful arrest. “Videos, pictures and accounts of the arrest were subsequently published on various social media platforms.
The said DIS officers reasonably foresaw or ought to have reasonably foreseen what such publications would result in,” he said. Furthermore, the Lobatse lawmaker pointed out that being instructed to sit in the court’s accused persons’ dock when he was not even an accused person and in full view of the public and journalists was intended to humiliate and injure his feelings, because as a result he was photographed and videoed by members of the media. He said this created an impression in the minds of the public that he was accused of murder and an impression that he had committed a serious offence, was a flight risk and a dangerous criminal.
Matsheka emphasised that the act of shackling him was malicious and that the DIS officers ought to have known it would result in him being all over all media platforms and humiliated. In conclusion to his demands, and according to the notice, failure by the state to pay, Matsheka will take legal action seeking judgment in the following terms; declaring that the arrest was wrongful, unlawful; and injurious, that the DIS officers did not possess power under the Act or any other law, to arrest him for the alleged offence, that the detention at the police station under the overall charge of the Commissioner of Police and or the DIS facility at Gaborone was wrongful, unlawful and injurious. “Further declaring that the act of placing leg shackles on me by officers of the DIS and the police, to make him sit in the dock with foreseeable consequence that I would be photographed and videoed by the media in that position when he was not accused person was without justifiable cause, wrongful, unlawful and injurious,” reads the notice.
Meanwhile, the brief facts are that at or about 1900 hours on August 2, 2022 at house 5412 Partial, Gaborone in full view of members of the public and journalists, certain officers were acting in the normal course and scope of their employment and arrested the MP allegedly without a warrant. Following the said incident, Matsheka was unlawfully, wrongfully arrested and detained for the period from August 2, at or about 1900 hours to August 7, 2022 at or about 1630 hours, when he was released by the order of the High Court after his wife filed an urgent application demanding his immediate release.