Challenge to Seriti report on arms deal

Corruption Watch and the Right2Know Campaign (R2K) claim to have proof the Seriti Commission, set up by former president Jacob Zuma to investigate the R30 billion arms deal, lied to the public, ignored key information and made no attempt to investigate serious allegations of corruption.

The two organisations today filed a further affidavit with the High Court in Pretoria challenging the findings of the commission led by Judge Willie Seriti that there was no evidence of corruption in the military acquisition project finalised by the South African government in 1999.

They filed their application almost two years ago, but the process was hampered by the state attorney’s delay in filing the documents that led to the commission being set up and on which its findings were based, but were never released to the public, they said.

The affidavit is based on parts of the “still incomplete” record of decision they were eventually supplied with.

According to the two organisations, the documents allege that the commission of inquiry, which first sat in 2013, lied to the public and hid evidence of corruption, failed to access information from abroad and made no attempt to investigate the serious allegations of corruption before it, or new allegations that came to light.

Corruption Watch’s head of legal Leanne Govindsamy said it had never been more important to expose the flawed and inadequate processes followed by the Seriti Commission and the way that key information had been ignored in arriving at its conclusion.

She said the evidence included that former president Thabo Mbeki, Seth Phalatse, Richard Charter and Niall Irving had an “intimate dinner” in 1998 during the arms deal selection process.

Mbeki was the head of the Cabinet subcommittee tasked with the selection process, Phalatse was at Armscor and the others were agents and employees of BAE Systems.

The commission did not investigate these allegations, nor was Mbeki questioned about this during his appearance, and no mention of the allegation was made in the commission’s report.

There is also information on how the commission was advised that Phalatse paid bribes to Sipho Zikode, an official of the department of trade and industry, to secure offset credits for a BAE Systems project, which the commission did not investigate at all.

Phalatse was not called to give evidence, and it was not mentioned in the report.

Alfred Tshabalala of R2K said the documents vindicated civil society efforts to get transparency and accountability from the Seriti Commission when it was sitting, which was refused.