The long-awaited report on the controversial multibillion arms deal is to be tabled in parliament next week, and MPs from the standing committee on public accounts (Scopa) are expected to sit late into the December recess to consider its contents.

Scopa chairperson Gavin Woods said Auditor-General Shauket Fakie had assured National Assembly Speaker Frene Ginwala that the report would be tabled by next week.

While the national assembly is due to go into recess on November 16, MPs on Scopa and other committees, such as finance, trade and industry, and defence, might have to stay on to consider the report, Woods told the committee.

In terms of a provisional programme presented by Woods, Scopa members might have to stay at parliament until December 18 to prepare a report on the arms deal.

The auditor-general, the national directorate of public prosecutions and the public protector are probing allegations of wrongdoing in the arms deal.

ANC chief whip Tony Yengeni resigned recently after being charged with corruption, fraud, statutory perjury and forgery arising out of a discount of R167 386 on his luxury 4x4 vehicle obtained through one of the companies linked to the arms deal.

The consensual nature of Scopa, traditionally chaired by a member of the opposition, was marred by vicious in-fighting, which started after a dispute over what role the Special Investigating Unit, then headed by former judge Willem Heath, should play.

The non-partisan nature of the committee, which oversees public spending, was destroyed when the ANC differed with other parties on whether Scopa had originally intended for Heath to be involved.

Many of the committee's meetings during the first half of the year were marked by bitter exchanges on matters related to the arms-deal probe.

Former ANC MP Andrew Feinstein, who had led the ANC delegation on Scopa, resigned after questioning the ANC's stance on the probe.

The committee has begun "healing itself" after concerted attempts by Woods and, to a lesser degree, Vincent Smith of the ANC, but doubts have been expressed about whether the committee can withstand another bout of fireworks from the arms-deal report.

Pointing out the "sharp" differences between parties on the arms probe in the past in which members had "almost become enemies", Billy Nair (ANC) warned yesterday that the committee would be in for a long and drawn-out process.

With acknowledgement to Andre Koopman, The Star and Independent Online.