Former Vlakplaas operative Almond Nofemela may soon be a free man. Nofemela turned to the Pretoria High Court in an attempt to be freed following a 21-year stint in jail. He was recommended for parole by the parole board in February.
The recommendation was awaiting the signature of Correctional Services Minister Ngconde Balfour, Nofemela's attorney, Julian Knight, said. "The document has been on Balfour's desk since March and he has done nothing about it. I wrote to ask him to make up his mind, not to place Nofemela on parole, but to make a decision to either rubber stamp the approval or refuse it," he said. Nofemela went to court in an urgent bid to get answers. Correctional Services, represented by a senior and a junior advocate, asked for a two-week postponement, as the department was not ready to go ahead. The matter was eventually postponed for a week, and on Friday the minister agreed to consider Nofemela's placement on parole. The agreement was made an order of court by Judge Eberhard Bertelsmann. Knight said if the minister refused Nofomela parole, he would go to the Constitutional Court.
On the eve of his intended execution in the 1980s for the non-political killing of a Skeerpoort farmer, Nofemela spilled the beans on the security police hit squad operating from the Vlakplaas base. His death sentence was later commuted to a life sentence.
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