Sunday Times

ANC top six, Cyril too, were ‘told all about Prasa graft’

- By MAWANDE AMASHABALA­LA

● The ANC may have to go back to the Zondo commission to answer fresh allegation­s that its top brass ignored reports of rampant corruption brought to them.

Prasa chair Popo Molefe dropped a bombshell at the state capture commission this week, saying the ANC top six turned a blind eye to corruption allegation­s at the passenger rail company.

Molefe told deputy chief justice Raymond Zondo that he met with the ANC at its headquarte­rs in 2015.

Molefe said he laid bare the rampant corruption that was going on at Prasa at the time under then CEO Lucky Montana, including contracts worth billions of rands that had been entered into irregularl­y.

In that meeting, Molefe said he told the ANC top brass that the Prasa board had picked up corruption in a tender process for the modernisat­ion of the Braamfonte­in depot, worth R2bn. Molefe said that was the last he heard from the ANC bigwigs.

The top six at the time consisted of Jacob Zuma, his deputy Cyril Ramaphosa, Gwede Mantashe as secretary-general, ANC chair Baleka Mbete, treasurer-general Zweli Mkhize and deputy secretary-general Jessie Duarte.

Zondo said he is interested in hearing the ANC leaders’ side of the story.

“I want to know what they did about what you told them, not from you, of course, because you told me already that they never came back to you,” Zondo told Molefe.

“When they come here I want to know what they did. We are all aware about what is in the public domain about Prasa and other state-owned enterprise­s, and it would appear these things do not start just now.

“And it is only proper that this commission should ask the question to some of these people: where were you and what did you do about this?

“You told the top six and you alerted them, and are there no steps that they ought to have taken to make sure that Prasa is not where it is today in terms of its financial position?”

Molefe began his testimony in March and was back for two days this week to wrap up his four days of testimony in total.

He laid the blame for the corruption, fraud and maladminis­tration that brought Prasa to its knees on state capture.

He was, however, clear that some individual­s might have unwittingl­y aided state capture at Prasa as they sought to protect their livelihood­s from the powerful network that ran affairs, led by Zuma and his cronies.

During the same eventful 2015 in which Molefe was, he said, ignored by the ANC officials, he was in a meeting with Zuma, then minister on the presidency Jeff Radebe, and Montana, who by that time had been axed.

“So the president says, ‘This young man [Montana] is very experience­d. He is experience­d and has the skills the country needs. In my view he should not be lost to the country and some solution must be found to allow him to continue plying his skills in this important organisati­on’,” Molefe told the commission in March.

“The solution the president was suggesting was that the decision the board had taken to release Mr Montana [a month before] be reviewed.

“My response to the president was that I cannot make a commitment in a private meeting on a matter decided upon by the board of control of Prasa, a state organ. I said to him, ‘Mr Montana did not have a lifetime contract at Prasa and therefore, Mr President, I cannot agree with you, but I can convene a board meeting where you can explain what is your problem’.”

The commission will continue hearing evidence tomorrow.

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