Bloemfontein - President Thabo Mbeki knew three weeks before he appointed the Hefer Commission of Inquiry that super-prosecutor Bulelani Ngcuka had been investigated by the ANC in the 1980s for being an apartheid spy.

This was claimed yesterday by former transport minister Mac Maharaj, who was giving evidence under subpoena. He said Ngcuka had in all probability been an apartheid agent.

He told the Hefer commission he went to see Mbeki about Ngcuka at 2pm on August 23 this year.

Maharaj offered no details about his meeting with Mbeki.

The Hefer Commission of Inquiry was appointed in September to investigate claims that Ngcuka had been a spy and abused his power as National Director of Public Prosecutions.

Maharaj made a scathing attack on Ngcuka, but was unable to back up allegations that he had been an apartheid-era spy.

He claimed that "Scorpion leaks" to the press had caused fundamental attacks on his integrity and on that of other people.

"We all have children who are asked questions about their fathers. My integrity is the only thing I have in life and I am here to redeem it," he said.

Fluctuating between anger and occasional tears, Maharaj said Ngcuka was effectively responsible for eroding the country's democratic values.

But Maharaj, a veteran leader of the struggle for liberation, was unable to refute conclusively allegations that his evidence was tainted with bias because of bitterness about a Scorpions investigation of him.

He told the commission he had spent his life in the struggle "and undergone torture that left one arm paralysed for three months".

There were at least "five deadly sins" he believed Ngcuka had committed, Maharaj said.

Maharaj had wanted to quit politics, devote his life to his family and end his days sitting in a rocking chair.

But Ngcuka's behaviour had made him realise he needed to put his boots back on and fight for democratic values.

Now, he said, if he ever made it to a rocking chair, he would have to keep his boots beside him.

His main allegations against Ngcuka were that:

Ngcuka leaked information to the press. This was in contravention of the National Prosecuting Act, Maharaj claimed.

He had to hear from Sunday Times journalist Jessica Bezuidenhout that he was under investigation for possible corruption. The questions asked him by the Scorpions and the Sunday Times were "striking" in their similarity. He found out that Ngcuka had an off-the-record briefing with six newspaper editors and told them that Maharaj's wife, Zarina, was to be charged with tax evasion.

Ngcuka "lied". He had told Maharaj his wife would not be charged with tax evasion, despite what he had told the editors. Ngcuka had denied reports that he was attempting to sort out the growing tension around the arms deal investigation through "mediation", whereas he was doing so, Maharaj claimed.

Ngcuka refused to exonerate an innocent man. Maharaj claims the investigation found no evidence to support the allegations against him, but Ngcuka refused to say so in public until the arms deal probe had been concluded.

Ngcuka tried to resolve the conflict over the arms deal investigation by mediation. This involved Maharaj's being used as a "tool" to convince Deputy President Jacob Zuma and his financial adviser, Schabir Shaik, to co-operate with the Scorpions.

Maharaj said, however, that he had helped draw up the National Prosecuting Act and knew there was no room for mediation.

Ngcuka's smearing of certain people was destructive of South Africa's new democracy.

Evidence leader Kessie Naidu, SC, asked Maharaj what role his bitterness about the Scorpions investigation against him had played in his making the spy allegations. Maharaj said he would have brought up the spy allegations even if he had not been investigated.

Naidu was not convinced.

"Deputy President Jacob Zuma, Schabir Shaik, KwaZuluNatal MEC Zwele Mkhize, Tony Yengeni and Allan Boesak all claimed to have been victimised," he said. "Why did you mention the allegations only when you were the one to be investigated?"

Naidu asked Maharaj if he had anything but ANC intelligence operative Mo Shaik's word that Ngcuka was a spy.

Naidu: "Who else did he tell about Ngcuka's being investigated for being a spy?"

Maharaj: "I will not give names, but I brought it to the attention of high-ranking ANC members."

With acknowledgements to Estelle Ellis, Jeremy Gordin and the Cape Times.