July 2021 unrest: State wants to add terrorism and treason charges

The suspects in the July 2021 unrest could soon be facing charges of terrorism and treason.

This is according to police minister Bheki Cele, who told reporters on the sidelines of the ANC national executive committee (NEC) meeting at Birchwood on the East Rand that the state was looking into amending the charge sheet from incitement of violence to terrorism and treason.

“What we are doing with them, we are increasing the charges. We want to move the charges from ordinary incitement and all to terrorism and treason,” said Cele.

“So it looks like we’re finding that there’s quite some good except that Mercedes-Benz guy that has been sentenced. There are many more that are going to be coming.

“We have arrested 63 people about the July 2021 [unrest], those people are in court. Why are they not sentenced? That you can ask [justice minister Ronald] Lamola,” said Cele.

“But we have arrested them, they are all in courts, some of them are on bail.”

Hundreds of people rioted in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng after the arrest of former president Jacob Zuma.

The civil unrest was characterised by destruction of property, looting and loss of life.

At least 300 lives were lost and the scale of destruction of property has been estimated at billions of rand.

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