A political firestorm over an aborted attempt to charge South African Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan with fraud has ignited a power struggle between the head of a special police unit that carried out the investigation and the nation’s chief prosecutor, deepening a crisis in the criminal justice system. The battle came to light in an exchange of letters in which Berning Ntlemeza, the head of the Hawks police unit, accused chief prosecutor Shaun Abrahams of bowing to political pressure when he dropped the charges against Gordhan, and Abrahams suggested the police withheld information pertinent to the case. Two civil rights groups have filed lawsuits aimed at forcing both men out of their jobs. On Tuesday, President Jacob Zuma said he’d asked Abrahams to explain why he shouldn’t be suspended. The latest dispute signals the widening fallout from the feud between Gordhan and Zuma over the management of state companies and the affordability of nuclear power plants the president wants to ...
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