Publication: Business Day
Issued:
Date: 2007-01-30
Reporter: Edith February
|
SA Still Owed the Truth on Arms Deal |
Asked
about the most recent allegations to surface surrounding the arms deal,
President Thabo Mbeki was at pains to reaffirm that government’s contracting
position was “in no way flawed”. Of course, given his careful choice of words, Mbeki was technically correct. The
Joint Investigative Team appointed to investigate allegations of corruption
associated with the arms deal exonerated government from all “improper or
unlawful conduct”.
But this is of little comfort now that the Serious
Fraud Office (SFO) in the UK is investigating allegations that BAE Systems paid
more than R1bn in “commissions” in a bid to secure the more than R30bn deal with
the South African government for Hawk jets and Gripen fighters. As more and more
allegations surface in the media, it is abundantly clear that Mbeki’s technical
responses have become insufficient to explain away allegations of corruption.
It’s easy to forget what the arms deal is all about
*1. It is probably fair to say that Patricia de Lille played a key role
in bringing the issue of possible arms deal-related corruption to our attention
when she arrived at the opening of Parliament in 1999 with a sweater
proclaiming: “The arms deal is out of my hands”.
If reports are to be
believed, it all started as far back as 1992, when
arms dealers came a-courting, and SA seemed only too keen to please. Eventually,
in 1999, the deal whose precise cost is always a matter of dispute, but it
runs into billions of rand saw the executive enter into five main contracts
for submarines, helicopters, lead-in fighter-trainers (Hawks), corvettes and
advanced light fighter aircraft (Gripens).
The evaluation of tenders was
first considered by four committees looking at technical merits and financial
details and two committees dealing with the offset benefits. The government
“sold” the deal to the public on the basis that the offsets (in the form of
jobs and investments) would outstrip the expenditure. Whether this is so remains
to be seen, but there have been several reports of offset
obligations not being fully met.
The current controversy
surrounding BAE Systems is interesting for a few reasons. In 2000, Parliament’s
standing committee on public accounts (Scopa), with Gavin Woods as chairman, had
in fact raised several concerns about the procedural regularity of the various
arms deal transactions in its now controversial 14th report on the arms deal.
Ironically, Scopa’s concerns related to the lead-in fighter-trainer contract for
Hawk jets awarded to BAE, then known as British Aerospace.
The salient
question was why the contract was awarded to British Aerospace when clearly it
was not the most cost-effective option. Scopa raised concerns about the reasons
for the basis of the evaluation process being changed
as regards the Hawk jets. In its report, Democracy and the Arms Deal: an Interim
Review, of May 15 2001, the Institute for Democracy in SA (Idasa) raised several
questions in relation to the contract for Hawk jets. These included:
- For
what reason was the evaluation basis changed from a costed to a noncosted basis
at such a late stage in the tender process?;
- Who made that decision and
why?;
- Were other tenderers told of the change and, if not, why not?;
and
- What are/were the cost implications for SA as a result of those
changes?
These questions seem as relevant today as
they did in 2001. In addition, the then minister of defence (between 1994
and 1999), Joe Modise, was the subject of an investigation by the National
Prosecuting Authority before his death in 2001. Modise was consistently linked
to allegations that he intervened to eliminate cost as a
criterion in the evaluation process relating to the Hawks. Modise also
allegedly stood to gain from the offsets as he was a shareholder in Conlog, one
of the companies set to benefit from the deal with BAE.
And so the web
becomes more and more entangled as the arms deal takes on an international
strain. Suspicion abounds. In the absence of anything
other than the rumour mill, surely there is a case to be made for the arms deal investigation to be reopened? The public has the
right to have the unanswered questions answered and the right to more than
anodyne denials.
As the history of the arms deal has shown, if
allegations of corruption are not dealt with swiftly, they have a habit of
coming around again. It also seems that if we don’t deal with them in our own
backyard, the UK’s SFO may raise more uncomfortable questions though of course
that investigation will only be as effective as the mutual
legal assistance SA is prepared to offer the SFO. Let’s hope that there
is no foot-dragging.
• February is head of Idasa’s Political Information
& Monitoring Service.
With acknowledgements to Judith February and Business Day.
*1 What the arms deal is all about
:
- premeditated, conspired, corrupt, enrichment on a giant scale and to hell
with the taxpayer and citizen.
- Even the SAAF and SA Navy got equipment too early and too fancy for their
real needs and will have massive difficults in operating and maintaining this
equipment without going back to the Treasury with their annual begging
bowls.
- At the same time, the jewel in the South African high tech industry, being
the Defence and Related Industries, especially the electronics sector, was
effectively brought to its knees.
- Indeed control of almost the entire defence electronics industry is nor in
the hands of foreign companies: Thales International, EADS, Saab and BAE
Systems.
- When the Chief of the Chilean Navy recently visited this country to review
the SA Navy and its support infrastructure, he said that he would give his eye
teeth to have such a sophisticated and capable defence industry in his country
(which is quite similar in many respects South Africa: in terms of size, wealth,
distance from 1st world, non-alignment, etc.).
- So much for a strategic defence package.
- It's actually more like treason.