Essop Pahad's denial in the Sunday Times that he tried to derail the probe into the arms deal

'He said quite explicitly that we should just rescind the resolution'

Former ANC MP Andrew Feinstein confirmed this week that Minister in the Presidency Essop Pahad did try to bully ANC members of Parliament into abandoning a planned multiagency inquiry into arms deal corruption.

In a front-page story on November 26 2000 the Sunday Times reported that "Despite Pahad's denials that he had tried to have the [arms deal] probe stopped, senior ANC members who attended the meeting of the ANC's governance committee said he had spoken out against the process."

The Sunday Times was pressured into running an "unreserved" apology a week later.

Now Feinstein, who is in South Africa to promote his book After the Party, which reveals details of the arms deal cover up, has confirmed the original account.

"You now have a second source. You had nothing to apologise for," he said in an interview.

Feinstein recounts in his book that Parliament's Standing Committee on Public Accounts (Scopa) unanimously agreed to propose that Parliament appoint a multiagency investigation including Judge Willem Heath's Special Investigation Unit to probe continuing allegations of corruption in the multibillion-rand arms procurement package.

He said that on November 8 ­ as later reported by the Sunday Times and other newspapers ­ ANC members of the public accounts committee were summoned to a meeting with the party's high-level Governance Committee, which included Chief Whip Tony Yengeni, Deputy President Jacob Zuma and Pahad, who had been appointed a minister in the Presidency.

Though the constitution requires a separation of the powers of Parliament and Cabinet, the MPs were told by the executive members to reverse the call for a multiagency investigation.

"Who the f**k do you think you are, questioning the integrity of the government, the ministers and the President?" he quotes Pahad as saying.

He said Pahad had tried to persuade them to rescind the Scopa decision, but that Justice Committee chairman Johnny de Lange, who is now the deputy minister of Justice had explained this was beyond the party's power.

Feinstein acknowledges in the book that he leaked details of a caucus meeting about HIV/Aids policy to the Mail & Guardian, but insisted this week he did not leak details of the Pahad meeting to any journalist.

Details were published in the Sunday Times and Pahad quickly denied his reported role.

In an article carried by The Sunday Times he accused the paper of "regurgitating the lie" that he had tried to pressure ANC MPs to back off from the inquiry into arms deal purchases.

"The public should be informed in explicit terms that at no stage did I try in any way to derail the inquiry," he wrote.

The newspaper apologised.

Feinstein said this week, however, that Pahad had indeed tried to halt the investigation.

"First of all he intimidated us. Second of all, he said quite explicitly that what we should do was just rescind the resolution ­ in other words not call for an investigation."

With acknowledgement to Brendan Boyle and The Times.