FRIDAY, 1.00PM:
ROBERT McBRIDE, the Foreign Affairs official arrested in Mozambique three months ago on dubious gun-running charges, has released a statement explaining his side of the affair.
McBride says he went to Mozambique to verify claims from Vusi Mbatha (the informer behind the Meiring report) that Alex Huambo, a former supplier of arms to the Inkatha Freedom Party, was continuing gunrunning in Maputo. He wished to verify Mbatha’s information before informing authorities in both countries. He suspected Huambo was supplying arms to the Gauteng cash heist gangs.
He emphasises that he was not working for any intelligence agency, though he did represent Foreign Affairs on the National Intelligence Estimates Board.
He says that after Mbatha was arrested he drove to the border, where police intercepted him, but did not arrest him, allowing him to spend the night in a hotel. Only after a South African police attach described him as a bomber to the Mozambicans was he detained.
McBride believes Mbatha conspired with his old paymasters in the South African security forces (he is a known security police informant) to set up McBride and provide “supporting evidence” of a left-wing plot to overthrow the government, as described in the Meiring report.
Huambo in turn arranged with contacts in the police to simply take McBride and Mbatha’s money without supplying weapons.
Once McBride was arrested, he believes the South African police took advantage of the situation to mislead the Mozambicans. He points out that although Mbatha’s story changed many times, it changed most dramatically after his South African police interrogation.
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