Publication: The Times Issued: Date: 2008-03-15 Reporter: Moipone Malefane

Come Clean on the Arms Deal, ANC tells Mbeki

 

Publication 

The Times
Date

2008-03-15
Reporter Moipone Malefane

Web Link

www.thetimes.co.za

 

"People are pushing that Thabo must come and explain. Did he get a bribe or not? This thing is not complete. It is big"
 
Party leaders want to summon the President to explain himself

Business magnate and senior ANC leader Tokyo Sexwale has called on President Thabo Mbeki to explain his involvement in the controversial multibillion- rand arms deal.

Sexwale made an impassioned plea to a hushed ANC National Executive Committee (NEC) meeting on Friday for Mbeki "to take the ANC into his confidence" and explain whether there is any substance to the German investigation that has allegedly implicated Mbeki in arms-deal corruption.

Sexwale's call was supported by the majority of NEC members ­ some of whom said Mbeki must tell if he also received a bribe from arms companies.

The ANC's NEC meeting began on Friday in Johannesburg and is expected to finish its business tomorrow.

Mbeki did not attend the meeting, although he has the right to attend as an ex-officio member.

The meeting also came during a week when ANC president Jacob Zuma and French arms company Thint were fighting a desperate Constitutional Court battle to overturn a Durban High Court ruling that the National Prosecuting Authority could seek documents from Mauritius to use as evidence against Zuma.

Zuma faces a corruption trial for allegedly soliciting a bribe from the French arms company in exchange for protecting it against any corruption investigation in South Africa.

Although Zuma was present when Sexwale made the call for Mbeki to be summoned to appear before the NEC, he did not contribute to discussions on the arms deal.

An NEC insider said Sexwale and other NEC members had stressed that the party needed to know the "full truth" to prevent it from being embarrassed by revelations should the arms deal scandal spiral out of control.

"Comrade Tokyo's call is valid. We want to know our government's involvement into the arms deal," an NEC member said.

"Remember, the ANC is the ruling party and we want to protect the integrity of the state."

According to another NEC member, "people are pushing that Thabo must come and explain.

Did he get a bribe or not? This thing is not complete. It is big."

According to senior NEC members, Sexwale's call was triggered by a report in Friday's Mail & Guardian which alleged that Mbeki, some government officials and the ANC have benefited financially from the arms deal kickbacks.

The newspaper revealed that arms giant ThyssenKrupp desperately lobbied the government ­ in particular Justice Minister Brigitte Mabandla ­ to head off a German investigation into South Africa's arms deal scandal.

The paper said a lawyer for a local ThyssenKrupp representative, Sven Moeller, repeatedly wrote to Mabandla and Justice Department Director-General Menzi Simelane to try to prevent the seizure of documents and the interrogation of witnesses in South Africa.

The German prosecuting authorities are probing claims that the company bribed South African officials and politicians to land a contract for warships for the navy, and have formally asked Pretoria for assistance.

Last year, Mbeki set tongues wagging when he angrily labelled former British prime minister Tony Blair a "hypocrite" when that country's investigators began looking into British Aerospace System's conduct in the sale of aircraft to South Africa.

Zuma has himself previously threatened to one day reveal the whole truth about the arms deal and intimated to the Pietermaritzburg High Court that he could call Mbeki as a witness in his trial.

The NEC meeting was described by another member as "sometimes frank but brutal *1".

The meeting, according to insiders, also saw Housing Minister Lindiwe Sisulu launch a scathing attack on the government's chief policy strategist and Mbeki ally Joel Netshitenzhe. This, after the latter warned the meeting of running the risk of "killing the ANC".

It is not clear what Netshitenzhe was referring to when he made the remark.

The arms deal scandal has become an albatross around the ruling party's neck.

The newly elected NEC announced that it would launch its own independent probe into the arms deal.

The ANC put together a team of eight party leaders, including the party's deputy president, Kgalema Motlanthe, treasurer- general Mathews Phosa, and NEC members Cyril Ramaphosa, Jeremy Cronin, Siphiwe Nyanda and Sisulu to look into the matter.

The ANC said it wanted to get what it described as a "detailed, factual report on the arms deal to enable the NEC to apply its mind on the issues and provide leadership". The team has not concluded its job.

Mbeki has repeatedly pleaded ignorance about his suspected involvement with people implicated in the multibillion-rand arms deal corruption, saying he could "honestly not recall" a 1998 meeting in Paris with representatives of Thint, then known as Thompson CSF.

However, South Africa's former ambassador to France, Barbara Masekela, has revealed that Mbeki met representatives of the company, which is the same one accused of bribing Zuma.

Masekela, who personally arranged the meetings, has since been grilled on the matter by the Scorpions.

She has said that she had arranged a "courtesy" meeting *5 between Mbeki and the arms company Thompson CSF on December 17 1998, when Mbeki was still deputy president and chairman of the Cabinet committee that was overseeing the arms deal.

Despite the meeting having taken place a year before Thompson was awarded a R1.3- billion share in SA's controversial arms deal, Masekela has insisted that there was nothing untoward about it. Masekela is set down as one of the witnesses at the Zuma trial.

Zuma is understood to have warned the NEC meeting about the party remaining divided following the highly contested Polokwane conference.

Zuma told the NEC members that it was important to "protect" the ANC *6 and ensure that the image of ANC leaders who were not members of the NEC was not tarnished.

With acknowledgements to Moipone Malefane and The Times.
 


*1       That means :
always brutal, but not always frank.
It stops getting frank when NEC members are asked about their cars and their buddies' cars, given by Mickey Woerfel - another German bribery expert *2.


*2      Who, just like Tony Georiades and the deliciously named Jurgen Koopman, worked hard at bribing all and sundry on behalf of the German Strategic Alliance *3.


*3      Including the German Frigate Consortium (including ThyssenKrupp), DACA (Daimler Chrysler Aerospace), the German Submarine Consortium (including Ferrostaal), European Aeronautic Space and Defence company (EADS), Siemens, BMW, MTU - all companies bidding for one or other part of the complete Arms Deal *4.


*4      The following German companies were succesful :
the German Frigate Consortium (including Blohm+Voss, HDW and Thyssen);
the German Submarine Consortium (including HDW and Ferrostaal),
Siemens;
MTU (which is partly owned by BMW).
DACA (Daimler Chrysler Aerospace) was partly successful in selling the RTS6400 tracking radar for the corvettes via its part ownership of Reatech Radar Systems (RRS).

DACA missed out on the big one, two versions of its AT200 jet fighter and jet trainer, because these were paper aircraft while the request for information stipulated proven designs.

But that never stopped Mickey Woerfel splashing out on some 33 Merc discounts for, inter alia :

*5      She lies - this was not courtesy meeting.

This was the second or third of three or four meetings and in this case there was a very specific objective with a pre-determined agenda.

*6      That's all that is important.

Protecting other natural and corporate citizens of the country, the country itself, or the truth - now that's not important.


Only the pigs have changed.