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Despite police threat to charge members of Operation Dudula

Tebogo Monama

Tebogo Monama

The anti-piracy campaign Operation Dudula yesterday vowed to continue tracking down pirates and reporting them to the police.

This follows last week's raid of ER24 offices in Kempton Park, which were thought to be a fake CDs and DVDs warehouse by musicians who are members of Operation Dudula.

Police then threatened to charge them.

South African Police Services spokesman Cheryl Engelbrecht said: "There is a possibility that they will be charged, but it has not been confirmed yet. We take it they raised a false alarm."

Spokesman for Operation Dudula, Mzwakhe Mbuli, said they accepted that they made a mistake, "but that would not detract us from doing the good job we have been doing so far.

"Our informer, who is a private investigator, led us to the spot in Kempton Park. He has helped us to successfully bust many pirates," Mbuli said.

"Operation Dudula has been a success. Why should the focus now be on one failure?"

Meanwhile, the Chinese national, Zhouren Chen, whose property in Cyrildene was raided last month, wants to press theft charges against the musicians.

He claims money was stolen during the raid when police, Department of Trade and Industry officials and Operation Dudula members confiscated CDs and DVDs estimated to be valued at R4million.

The charges against Chen were withdrawn because the artists raided the house without a search warrant.

But he has been recharged after he pleaded guilty to manufacturing fake DVDs.

He will appear in court on June 28.

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