Auditor-General Shauket Fakie has been granted leave to appeal against a Pretoria High Court ruling that he hand over documents relating to the arms deal. Richard Young, whose company CCII Systems lost out on a contract to supply combat technology to SA Navy corvettes is suing Fakie.

Fakie's request was granted this week by Judge Willie Hartzenberg and will be heard in March.

As a result of the appeal, Fakie was not obliged to honour the 40-day deadline, set by the court, to hand over to Young any documents relating to the arms deal that had not been identified as sensitive during the trial.

Young is claiming R150m from government for damages he suffered because of irregularities and political interference in the selection process, and applied under the Promotion of Access to Information Act, for among others, copies of the draft arms probe report, which preceded the final report tabled in Parliament.

The final report exonerates all cabinet ministers from any wrongdoing.

Fakie had refused Young access to the documentation on the grounds of confidentiality and the amount of work required and the country's security considerations.

The deal Young's company lost went instead to French company Detexis, a sister company of African Defence Systems, of which Shabir Shaik was a shareholder.

He is the brother of the defence department's former head of acquisitions, Shamin "Chippy" Shaik.

Joining the application for leave to appeal is National Director of Public Prosecutions Bulelani Ngcuka, then Public Protector Selby Baqwa and Defence Minister Mosiuoa Lekota.

In their papers asking for leave to appeal, the three agencies and the ministry return to their original argument that the auditor-general does not have enough resources to identify what documents need to be handed to Young and searching for the papers would divert Fakie's resources.

Hartzenberg in the original case has already responded to this argument by saying that it was a matter of such importance that if Fakie had to hire more staff simply to comply with Young's request, then he would have to do it.

The court has told Fakie to identify documents he believes cannot be released and give his reasons.

With acknowledgements to Chantelle Benjamin and the Business Day.

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