With Seriti shattered, truth about arms deal must follow — and consequences

Commissions of inquiry are generally initiated to prise the veil of secrecy from sensitive topics. In some cases, however, politicians use them to be seen to be doing something, while further muddying the waters around an issue on which they are reluctant to act. But it is an unusual commission of inquiry whose sole aim is to obscure, and to cover up. And that, quite obviously now, seems to have been the objective of the ill-starred Seriti commission of inquiry into the arms deal, headed by judge Willie Seriti. It is common knowledge (except to the judge, perhaps) that top figures in the ANC and the government benefited handsomely from the arms deal contracts. This display of extravagance bought us planes whose use has been largely confined to fly-pasts for presidential inaugurations, and submarines and frigates that rarely venture out to sea, leaving important naval tasks to 40-year-old vessels while much of the navy’s budget is spent on salaries. All this, when one might have thought that the billions spent could have gone much more usefully towards social upliftment programmes, post-1994.

At the centre of the long and intricate arms deal cover-up has been former president Jacob Zuma, whose political fortunes, and indeed own personal freedom, have been tied to this lamentable shopping spree. After all, he was fired as deputy president by thenpresident Thabo Mbeki as a result of suspected corruption relating to the arms deal.

It was the tapping of a telephone conversation between the then head of the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA), Bulelani Ngcuka, and then head of the Scorpions, Leonard McCarthy, in 2007, a month before the ANC’s Polokwane conference, that put Zuma on his path to power.

And who did Zuma have to thank for that phonetapping? It was Seriti himself who, as “interceptions judge”, gave the National Intelligence Agency the nod to listen in. And Zuma, with the enthusiastic help of his trade union and SACP allies at Polokwane, then edged out Mbeki and lost no time in disbanding the Scorpions, who had led the probe into arms deal corruption.

The phone-tapping would form the basis for the

NPA’s ill-fated decision not to prosecute Zuma in 2009, which cleared the way for him to become president.

While state agencies could be tamed and defanged to keep buried uncomfortable facts about dubious deals, civil-society organisations refused to join the charade.

Facing pressure from longtime arms deal anti-corruption crusader Terry CrawfordBrowne, who was prepared to go the Constitutional Court to force Zuma’s hand to set up a commission of inquiry, Zuma then appeared to fall in line. It would be the start of a long and expensive exercise in deception, costing the taxpayer about R140m. And who better to chair this pantomime than judge Seriti, who had come to Zuma’s aid before in the matter of the phone-tapping? Perhaps that was just a coincidence.

That was in 2011. Now, eight years later, the Seriti debacle has confirmed what critics said all along. That much was evident from the high-profile resignations of senior figures from the commission’s staff at the very least. Seriti’s conduct cries out for scrutiny.

Now, two civil-society organisations, Right2Know and Corruption Watch, have been vindicated. Trust in our courts has been confirmed. And for the first time, an entire commission’s findings have been upended.

The flimsy basis of Zuma’s claim that there was no corruption in the arms deal falls away. There can be no more excuses, no more delaying in bringing Zuma to account in respect of 783 questionable payments he allegedly received improperly in exchange for undertaking to protect French arms dealer Thales from prosecution.

To quote judge Dunstan Mlambo, whose judgment this week provided a flare of hope amid the dark shadow that state capture and political criminality have cast over our public life: “It is clear that the commission failed to inquire fully and comprehensively into the issues, which it was required to investigate on the basis of its terms of reference.”

There can be no more excuses … in bringing Zuma to account