Former African National Congress intelligence commander Mo Shaik declared on Monday that he has handed over a secret database containing information about 888 suspected apartheid government spies.

Shaik submitted a receipt to the Hefer Commission indicating that he has handed ten CD-roms to the legal adviser of Intelligence Minister Lindiwe Sisulu.

This happened on Sunday and was witnessed by the deputy director general of the South African Security Service, Shaik testified.

"I am no longer in possession of this database," he declared under cross-examination.

Shaik's testimony last week revealed that he kept the computer database even after the intelligence units of the former apartheid government and liberation movements were integrated after 1994.

It was compiled as part of the African National Congress's Project Bible, which was aimed at combatting government infiltration of the then liberation movement. Shaik commanded Project Bible within South Africa.

When Shaik - currently an adviser to the foreign affairs ministry - revealed his continued possession of the database, commissioner Joos Hefer advised him that he was probably committing a crime.

Legislation protects as confidential information gathered during an intelligence operation. To disclose this without permission from the intelligence authorities is a crime.

However, Shaik used spy reports from the database to reconstruct an apartheid-era intelligence report on National Director of Public Prosecutions Bulelani Ngcuka. The spy reports were stolen for Shaik from the files of the former security police.

His report concluded that Ngcuka was most probably apartheid government agent RS452.

Shaik handed this report to journalist Ranjeni Munusamy, who wrote a news story on the matter. He has since submitted the report on Ngcuka and its accompanying documentation as evidence to the Hefer Commission.

Shaik told Hefer last week that he regarded the database as belonging to the ANC. He would only hand it over if the ANC ordered him to do so, he said.

With acknowledgements to Sapa and www.iol.co.za.