Bloemfontein - Mo Shaik was apologetic at the Hefer Commission hearing yesterday.

His eyes brimming with tears and his voice breaking, the former ANC intelligence commander said: "If I have brought the country into disrepute, then I apologise."

Shaik emphasised, however, that he continued to suspect that National Director of Public Prosecutions Bulelani Ngcuka had been an apartheid spy.

If credible evidence to the contrary was provided, he would apologise, he said.

Shaik was a source of the spy allegation against Ngcuka that prompted the appointment of the commission of inquiry.

Shaik apologised "unconditionally" to Ngcuka for unintended impressions created by statements he made during his testimony last week.

He told the commission last week that he had reason to believe an apartheid government agent had worked in the office of Durban anti-apartheid lawyer Griffiths Mxenge.

He said he had been told this by former security policeman Dirk Coetzee, who had been in charge of Mxenge's assassination.

Ngcuka served his articles with Mxenge's firm of attorneys.

Shaik said the ANC's intelligence unit had reason to believe Ngcuka did not share Mxenge's "strong views of the ANC".

Mxenge had allegedly asked Ngcuka to leave his office for this reason.

Ngcuka had been "very hurt" by this "innuendo", his counsel, Marumo Moerane, SC, told Shaik yesterday.

He had been like a son to Mxenge.

Ngcuka had such a high regard for Mxenge and his wife, Victoria, that the building in which he worked today was named after them, Moerane said. Victoria Mxenge was murdered some time after her husband.

Shaik denied that he had suggested there was a correlation between his allegations - that is, that Ngcuka had informed on Mxenge.

"I apologise unconditionally," he said more than once.

Later yesterday, Shaik repeated that he had been defending Deputy President Jacob Zuma's honour.

The Scorpions, which Ngcuka heads, investigated possible allegations of corruption against Zuma.

It had been "a very difficult" decision for him to go public with the spy suspicions about Ngcuka, Shaik said.

Many people believed he had violated one of the fundamental principles of intelligence in doing so. Nevertheless, he believed it had been his duty as a citizen to do so.

"I believe strongly that there is abuse of office," Shaik said.

"Far too many people have agendas in my view."

The commission continues its hearings tomorrow.

With acknowledgements to Sapa and the Cape Times.