‘Myeni tried to stop probe’
Former SAA chairperson is alleged to have had access to police investigation of Bosasa
THE lead investigator of the commission of inquiry into state capture has revealed that controversial former South African Airways (SAA) chairperson Dudu Myeni had access to a confidential anti-corruption task team (ACTT) investigation into integrated management services company Bosasa.
Frank Dutton yesterday told the commission chaired by Deputy Chief Justice Raymond Zondo that former Bosasa chief operations officer Angelo Agrizzi showed him photographs of a monthly progress and audit report of the police’s ACTT on its probe of the company.
According to Dutton, Agrizzi informed him that Myeni had showed him the file at the Sheraton Hotel in Tshwane in September 2015.
He said a General Moodley and advocate Marijke de Kock, who was the prosecutor assigned to the Bosasa matter, had told him the photographs appeared to show an ACTT progress report.
Dutton said the commission’s investigators had not yet found the original document, and were still searching for it.
He described the file as containing confidential documents for correspondence between the police and the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) and was not for public consumption.
Last month, Agrizzi testified that Bosasa chief executive Gavin Watson instructed him to meet Myeni at the Sheraton Hotel as she had important information on the Hawks’ investigation into the company now known as African Global Operations.
Agrizzi said Myeni had informed Watson that she had had discussions and long meetings with the NPA.
Watson prepared R300 000 for Myeni and at the meeting, Agrizzi said, she produced a “police case docket” but refused to allow him to make copies. However, he managed to take photographs of parts of the file.
“I took the docket to a quiet spot and took a few photos on my cellphone. I was interrupted by Myeni who seemed very nervous. I thought it best to appease her and return the docket to her,” said Agrizzi.
Myeni apparently told Agrizzi and Watson that she was trying to arrange that the investigation be terminated.
The commission also heard testimony by News24 editor-in-chief Adriaan Basson, who detailed Bosasa’s desperate attempts to discredit him and his former colleague Carien du Plessis when they were investigating the controversial company over a decade ago.
Basson said he would receive aggressive calls from identifiable and unidentifiable numbers day and night and in the early hours of the morning.
He said his cellphone number had been distributed among Bosasa employees and they were tasked with calling him.
They accused him of endangering and threatening their livelihoods and jobs.
“It was upsetting. It was a Bosasa operation to intimidate and scare me,” he said.
Basson denied that he had ever visited Agrizzi’s house with his family, saying such a claim was completely false.
He said he had one meeting with Agrizzi in his home after he decided to blow the whistle on Bosasa.
Greg Lawrence, who worked with Gregg Lacon-Allan to provide Bosasa some of the cash the company used to bribe politicians and senior public servants, told Justice Zondo that he decided to start recording his cash deliveries to protect himself.
“I knew there must have been something underhanded. The rumour in the industry was that Bosasa bribed,” he said.
Lawrence said he delivered a few million rand in the 10 to 20 times he delivered the cash to Bosasa in about a year.
His food and alcohol distribution company would deliver cash to Bosasa as soon as it had R500000.
He said the minimum amount he delivered would be R200000 but sometimes it would be between R800000 and R1 million.
Lawrence said the cash deliveries allowed him to save and Bosasa repaid Lacon-Allan’s company through electronic transfers and paid him a commission.
Investigator Themba Mlambo told the commission that Deputy Correctional Services Minister Thabang Makwetla and ANC MP Vincent Smith had removed some of the security equipment installed in their homes by Bosasa.
Cameras installed by Bosasa in Makwetla and Smith’s houses in Bramley and Roodepoort respectively are not the same ones installed by technicians from the company’s subsidiary Sondolo IT, now known as Global Technological Systems.