A major corruption probe in KwaZulu-Natal took a bizarre twist this week when Attorney General Tim McNally abandoned prosecution of Inkatha Freedom Party officials whom its own provincial government had accused of fraud in court papers earlier this year.
The fraud allegations against top KwaZulu- Natal bureaucrats stem from a sworn statement by a Durban businessman, Sateesh Isseri. The Department of Justice put Isseri on the witness protection programme after he received death threats.
McNally announced this week he was pulling Isseri off the witness protection programme, a move Isseri believes could endanger his life. “I believe McNally’s office has given an open invitation to the corrupt officials who initially wanted to kill me that I’m now available for assassination,” he said on Thursday.
The statement Isseri wrote last August implicated IFP-affiliated bureaucrats in a scheme to siphon funds from the provincial government to party coffers. The scheme boiled down to over-invoicing handpicked businesspeople and splitting the proceeds between the businesspeople and party officials.
In August the Mail & Guardian reported on this statement, the police investigation, and on the fact Isseri himself was the subject of a criminal probe. McNally this week questioned Isseri’s credibility in a press statement which recapped the M&G article.
“I have decided not to institute any prosecution based on Isseri’s statement,” McNally said. But the thrust of Isseri’s statement has been corroborated in court papers before the Durban High Court filed by the office of provincial Premier Ben Ngubane. McNally said this week his office had not given him these papers before he announced he was dropping the case.
The M&G reported in July on Ngubane’s court papers, which outlined the province’s defence to a civil lawsuit Isseri launched in February for R740 000. Isseri claims the money is owed to him in terms of a contract to supply medical equipment. The provincial government’s defence was that officials named by Isseri were involved in a fraudulent conspiracy with Isseri, which exempted the government from Isseri’s claim.
The officials included PW Buthelezi, the province’s chief of expenditure. The government’s court papers said: “The defendant [the provincial government] admits the cheques for the amounts of R399 500 and R395 000 were issued, but it avers that the said cheques were issued by persons in the services of the defendant pursuant to a conspiracy of fraud entered into between the plaintiff and those servants of the defendant identified in paragraph 5.”
The M&G faxed McNally a copy of the papers. He agreed the province had effectively accused its own senior officials of fraud. McNally acknowledged the M&G had pointed out a “valid inconsistency” between his approach and that in the government’s court papers. But he stuck to his decision and implied the office of the state attorney had erred by implicating the officials named by Isseri.
After being contacted by the M&G, McNally discussed Isseri’s civil case with the relevant state attorney and advocate and said it appeared they had no extra information that could implicate Buthelezi and other named officials. McNally suggested the provincial government would probably have to change its defence. He refused to comment on whether the Office of the State Attorney had been negligent in implicating senior officials without sufficient evidence.
McNally said Isseri had been unable to identify photographs of key officials he named in his statement. The state attorney in charge of Isseri’s civil case, Stuart Chambers, said that after his discussion with McNally he was considering changing the government’s plea by removing the paragraph implicating individuals such as Buthelezi.
Chambers said he based the original plea on a several pieces of evidence, but declined to state categorically that there was no evidence implicating Buthelezi. He suggested other government officials could have been involved in the fraud.
Asked to comment on McNally’s decision to abort the prosecution, he said: “He [McNally)] may form a particular view at a particular time. There may be other evidence that will come to light in due course.” The commercial crime unit said this week it was still pursuing the case.
Superintendent Hendrik Engelbrecht of the unit in Durban said: “In our investigations so far one or two people have been identified [as corrupt]. The whole investigation is still going on, but in a new direction from now on.” The IFP failed to interdict the M&G from publishing sequels to its August report on Isseri’s statement.
The IFP’s application was dismissed with costs by the Pietermaritzburg High Court. Judge Hillary Squires said the M&G‘s article appeared balanced and well researched.