The probe into the R43-billion arms acquisition programme was being conducted by South Africa's constitutional and legal structures, and the government was giving all the assistance it could, Trade and Industry Minister Alec Erwin said on Wednesday. 

The investigation would come up with a result, he said during a second day of debate in the National Assembly on President Thabo Mbeki's opening-of-parliament address. 

Damage was being done to South Africa's image by those spreading perceptions they had no confidence in the instruments of state, Erwin said. 

Justice and Constitutional Development Minister Penuell Maduna said the exclusion of Judge Willem Heath's Special Investigating Unit had nothing to do with politics, but was based on sound legal and constitutional principles. 

'To duck and dive is suspicious in the extreme' 

The Constitutional Court had said - in a ruling in November last year - that Mbeki could not issue a proclamation for the unit to become involved based on malpractice "might" having been involved. 

Maduna said the chairperson of the standing committee on public accounts, Gavin Woods, had "admitted" in a newspaper interview at the weekend there was no evidence of corruption in the arms deal, and all allegations were highly speculative. 

Maduna said racism seemed to be the motivation for those wanting the Heath unit to become involved, as black empowerment groups were involved in arms deal contracts. 

The days of white supremacy and parliamentary sovereignty were over - with the Constitution being supreme - and parliament could not order the president to issue a proclamation for the Heath unit's involvement. 

Pan Africanist Congress president Stanley Mogoba said the apartheid trap door, which the liberation forces had closed, had been brought back by the arms deal. 

"Why, one asks, is it so difficult to use all the investigation tools at our disposal - the four commissions - to clear up this mess?" 

Mogoba said to make allegations of corruption was not a crime, "but to duck and dive is suspicious in the extreme". 

What was critical was not the personality or colour of Heath; people needed to be reminded that a black president (Nelson Mandela) had appointed him as head of the unit. 

"The issue here is greater than Judge Heath. We have to fight corruption in a transparent and convincing way. Our courts and history will deliver the final verdict," Mogoba said. 

With acknowledgement to Sapa and Independent Online