/ 23 October 2003

ANC: Zuma need not testify

The African National Congress on Thursday issued a press statement regarding the position of Deputy President Jacob Zuma with regards to the Hefer Commission of Inquiry, which is investigating allegations that National Director of Public Prosections Bulelani Ngcuka was an apartheid-era spy.

The statement notes that, among the many positions Zuma has held in the ANC, he also served as the head of ANC Intelligence in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

He operated ”not in his personal capacity but as part of the structures of the ANC and was accountable to the structures of the ANC” and his position ”was not distinct from the machinery of the ANC”.

According to the statement, all the ANC’s records relating to matters of intelligence were handed over to the relevant state institutions during the period of transition and the ruling party has no records that are relevant to the brief of the Hefer commission.

The statement concludes that there is therefore no basis for Zuma appear before the Hefer commission.