Toppling would-be bosses one day, guarding ANC big guns the next

AGENT 1

DURING my tenure at the unit, I came across the following issues that made me uncomfortable: Brothel The unit’s team members were encouraged by Skollie to create a cover as we were working from home and the neighbours were suspicious. I informed my neighbours that I was on suspension with full pay. One of the agents opened a club/brothel. I came to know about it as he was pestering one of our colleagues for the “two blondes’ money”. It transpired that this agent took two prostitutes from the club to his hotel and did not pay. The brothelowning agent also arranged prostitutes for other members when they visited Durban. I was very much unhappy about the brothel as a South African Revenue Service employee was also pimping young women. Some of the unit members also had companies that were doing business with SARS/the government.

Psychological profiling on unit members

Unit members were subjected to psychometric testing by two of their colleagues. Psychological profiling was also done on the members . . . by the two psychologists in the team, not by an independent party. This is not only illegal but unethical as they can use the results against the members. This practice also extended to taxpayers who were being investigated by SARS.

Unit members working as VIP bodyguards

Some of the unit members were working as VIP bodyguards for politicians while working for SARS. At least one individual did not have the experience or even a firearm to work as a bodyguard. The members were also not registered with the security industry regulatory body. One member who worked as a VIP bodyguard indicated that the cover allowed them to eavesdrop on some of the politicians’ conversations. During one of the car-racing meetings at Kyalami, some of the unit members were protecting senior ANC members. Mike Peega Mike was fired after he was arrested for rhino poaching. Mike claimed he was asked to infiltrate the poaching syndicate but SARS denied any knowledge after he was arrested.

Was the unit a cover for something?

While I was at the unit, I was under the impression that we were gathering intelligence for SARS’s national enforcement unit. When I later joined the national enforcement unit [now called national projects], I made a follow-up on the cases that I worked on while at the unit. None of the evidence/intelligence that I collected reached the national enforcement unit. For example, I was tasked to work on John Bredenkamp and prepared a dossier on his cigarette smuggling and arms deals. I later suspected that the reason that I was allocated the case was to get access to the enigmatic Fana Hlongwane [a key figure in the arms scandal]. I used two of the team members in the unit to debrief him . . . We solicited information on the arms deal and commission paid to Bredenkamp. Prominent journalist While working on the Bredenkamp matter, I was struggling to get an interview with the journalist who was working on the arms deal story. One of the unit members volunteered to assist me and told me that he’s got the journalist by “his balls”. The journalist flew to Pretoria to meet me after my colleagues intervened. The ex-Scorpions members About eight members of the unit came from the Directorate of Special Operations, or Scorpions. The members previously raided the house of JZ in Forest Town [Joburg] when they were with the directorate. One of the members was also previously caught by law enforcement agencies conducting surveillance on former police commissioner Jackie Selebi. These members had a history of targeting senior ANC members. The same members were offended when one team member attended a unit meeting at a lodge wearing an ANC shirt.

The ex-directorate members were highly paid but were the least experienced in the team. When the African team members started revolting, they were told to rejoin another unit in SARS as the ex-directorate members had left SARS and the unit was being disbanded. The members continued to work for SARS undercover. Race determined salary All the white staff members of the unit were appointed at grade 7 level or above. Out of the six grade 8 positions in the unit, five were white. The human resource consultant who handled our appointment was on grade 6. He then appointed himself as a “specialist — enforcement” (grade 7). I asked the agent about the discrepancies in the salary of the members. He indicated that the white members would never get another opportunity to get promotion and the African members should not worry as affirmative action would “sort them out”. Counter-intelligence All the computers in the team were first issued to an agent to “clean” before they were allocated. It later transpired that he was installing spyware on the SARS computers. Disturbing stories Unit members indicated that two agents were present when Leonard Radebe [who was tipped to be the next commissioner of SARS] met [alleged tax dodger] Dave King at a restaurant in Muldersdrift [in Gauteng]. It was alleged that Radebe’s unceremonious exit from SARS was orchestrated by the unit.

At that time it was stated that CCTV footage of the restaurant was used to confront Radebe. I did not see the footage, but CCTV cameras are normally mounted on the top and the angle will also be different if the footage was taken by a person sitting opposite you. Should it be proved that the agents took the footage, the next question to be asked is: was Radebe’s phone bugged, or how did the two know about the meeting?

It was also alleged that two agents arranged a meeting with Moe Shaik to offer him the file on the psychological profiling of a “star witness” in the Jacob Zuma corruption trial. The witness mentioned is the secretary of an arms deal company who was due to testify about the encrypted fax. The plan was to offer the file and record the transaction, which could either be used against JZ or help him beat the corruption charges. I am not aware if the transaction took place.