Witness tells how Bosasa received cash

Videos show ‘bribe money’ being delivered

A WITNESS at the commission of inquiry into state capture yesterday revealed further evidence by providing camera footage showing him delivering boxes and bags of cash to Bosasa, which the company used to pay bribes.

Greg Lawrence, who worked with Gregg Lacon-Allan to provide Bosasa with some of the cash the integrated management services company used to bribe politicians and senior public servants, told commission chairperson Deputy Chief Justice Raymond Zondo that he decided to start recording his cash deliveries to protect himself.

Lawrence recorded at least three videos, which were played during the commission’s hearing yesterday, clearly showing Bosasa employee Jacques van Zyl receiving the cash which could be up to R1million.

“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 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 Equal Trade through electronic transfers and paid him a commission.

The commission also heard that controversial former SA Airways chairperson Dudu Myeni had access to a confidential anti-corruption task team (ACTT) investigation into Bosasa.

Lead investigator Frank Dutton said former Bosasa chief operations officer Angelo Agrizzi showed him photographs of a monthly progress and audit report of the police’s ACTT investigation on its probe of the company.

According to Dutton, Agrizzi informed him that Myeni showed him the file at the Sheraton Hotel in Tshwane in September 2015.

He said a General Moodley and advocate M de Kock, 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 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 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. “I took the docket to a quiet spot and took a few photos on my cellphone,” 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 attempts to discredit him and his former colleague Carien du Plessis when they were investigating the controversial company a decade ago.

The commission will resume on Monday.