JOHANNESBURG – Video footage of a police officer being fatally shot during a shoot-out between SAPS officers and armed robbers seems to indicate that he was wounded by a colleague.

Police spokesperson Captain Kay Makhubela said: "The police responded to information of a business robbery in the early hours of January 12, 2017 that heavily armed suspects attacked one petroleum filling station where they forced entry, but failed to open the drop safe.

"They took off with an undisclosed amount of cash after damaging the tills."

Initial reports stated that Constable Tshepo Tladi was shot by a suspect while police were responding to a robbery.

The CCTV footage however shows four police officers exchanging gunfire with suspects that are out of frame.

The officer behind Tladi starts to shoot, but Tladi moves and is hit in the back of the head. He later died in hospital.

The Independent Police Investigative Directorate is investigating the incident.