ANC chief whip forced to break 130 days of silence on his Merc 

ANC Chief Whip Tony Yengeni has been grilled for four hours by a team of investigators probing the controversial R43-billion arms deal.

Yengeni had defiantly refused to offer a public explanation or tell Parliament how he ended up behind the wheel of a R359 000 Mercedes Benz within days of it being ordered as a "private staff" car by an armaments company.

But, questioned under oath for four hours on Friday, he finally broke the 130 days of silence he had maintained since the Sunday Times confronted him about the car in February this year. Flanked by his Johannesburg lawyer, he was subpoenaed to present himself at the 14th-floor Cape Town offices of the elite police crime-busting unit, the Scorpions, at 9am.

National Directorate of Public Prosecutions spokesman Sipho Ngwema said Yengeni would have "faced a sentence of up to 15 years in jail, a fine or both" if he had failed to comply with the subpoena.

Yengeni was questioned by an investigation team led by senior advocate Gerda Ferreira of the Scorpions Directorate of Special Operations.

Ngwema said Yengeni was subpoenaed in terms of the National Prosecution Authority Act.

"I can confirm that Mr Yengeni was questioned from 9am to 1pm on Friday at the Scorpions' offices in Cape Town."

Ngwema said investigators would examine his statements carefully before deciding if it was necessary to ask further questions.

Yengeni's spokesman, Dennis Cruywagen, said yesterday the Chief Whip "could not be reached for comment".

Yengeni's green ML320 hit the headlines after the Sunday Times published an exposé which raised several questions about how he acquired the car.

Other than protesting that he bought the car legitimately, Yengeni has refused to shed any light on:

Why he got the vehicle from a weapons company instead of a car dealership;

Why he waited seven months after registering it in his name to enter into a financial agreement with DaimlerChrysler Financial Services;

Whether he paid a deposit on the 4x4 and if so, how much; and

Whether he got a substantial discount on the vehicle.

Yengeni was chairman of parliament's joint standing committee on defence when he got the car in 1998. The committee played a key role in the government's decision to approve the R43-billion weapons package. His job as ANC chief whip is to ensure that MPs behave ethically.

During a six-month investigation, this newspaper has unmasked several officials who got generous discounts of as much as 45%, on luxury cars from the European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company.

Through a joint venture, EADS will benefit from two arms contracts - totalling R420-million - to fit radar and missile systems to four new navy corvettes.

Yengeni was the first official named by this newspaper in March. The naming of his wife and a friend who also got cars, forced EADS into a dramatic admission that they had helped 30 VIPs get cars.

This week, political parties called for the suspension of the defence force chief, Siphiwe Nyanda, after the Sunday Times revealed how he got two Mercedes-Benzes from EADS at vastly reduced prices.

Meanwhile, the Sunday Times discovered this week that Nyanda had accepted a discount in January on his silver S320 after pledging in public personally to uphold a code of conduct forbidding his troops from abusing their authority for personal gain.

He made this pledge a year ago at a ceremony in Pretoria at which the army unveiled the code for uniformed members of the SA National Defence Force. The code says: "I will not abuse my authority, position or public funds for personal gain, political motive or any other reason."

Defence Minister Mosiuoa Lekota, who also attended the function, warned soldiers: "For those who violate the code, the consequences will be dire."

Nyanda and several other top civil servants who got cars from EADS are also bound by a government code of conduct for the public service.

Yengeni is bound by a similar code of conduct for MPs.  

With acknowledgement to Andre Jurgens, Mzilikazi Wa Afrika, Jessica Bezuidenhout and the Sunday Times.