Over the past fortnight, the African National Congress has maintained that R11-million it received before last year’s elections was an ordinary donation from a private company. But Imvume Management was no ordinary private company, judging by its chief executive’s CV.
Documentation produced by another Imvume group company describes its boss, Sandi Majali, not only as the ANC secretary general’s “economic adviser”, but also places him close to party committees involved in fundraising and economic policymaking.
Majali’s lawyer this week denied his client “had any formal role or held any formal position in any ANC structure”. But he added: “As a party member and from time to time … he has provided advice to various structures within the ANC, including to the secretary general.”
The Mail & Guardian revealed a fortnight ago how, in December 2003, Imvume had paid R11-million to the ANC after getting an advance on a supply contract from PetroSA. When Imvume defaulted on paying that money to its own suppliers, the oil parastatal duplicated the payment. The effect was that public money went to party coffers.
In one of the ANC’s first responses, the party’s national spokesperson, Smuts Ngonyama, was quoted in the Cape Times as saying: “It really has very little to do with the ANC because it’s a business transaction between a company and PetroSA — that’s all …
“The ANC only features in that a donation was given to the ANC — it’s an issue that we believe is a pure business transaction.”
Later, Ngonyama was quoted in Business Day as saying: “We do not ask donors where their money comes from … The business relationship between Imvume and PetroSA and other parties is their business, not ours.”
On Monday ANC secretary general Kgalema Motlanthe insisted that “a distinction should be made between the ANC and private companies”. PetroSA had paid Imvume, a private company, and not the ANC.
Motlanthe was speaking at a press briefing following a national executive committee (NEC) meeting, which, among other issues, addressed the fight against corruption.
In effect, the ANC argument is that there was no culpability on the party’s part as the actors in each stage of the transaction were at a proper distance from each other.
Although it is rumoured that the relationship has since soured, there is evidence of great proximity between the company and the party, and specifically between Motlanthe and Majali, at the time the transaction took place. This would seem to undermine the ANC’s argument of proper distance.
Some evidence of this proximity is contained in two company profiles, dating back to 2003 and produced by two Imvume sister companies.
In both, Majali is profiled as Motlanthe’s “economic adviser”. One of them talks of Imvume’s “access and influence on economic policy” as part of its “winning formula”.
The other profile calls Majali “the head of implementation of the ANC Economic Transformation Committee” and “adviser to the Finance Committee representing the office of the secretary general [of the ANC]”.
It is not clear exactly what these two positions entail. The ANC NEC has a number of subcommittees, including the Economic Transformation Committee and the National Finance Committee. The powerful Economic Transformation Committee deals with economic policy, in particular issues of transformation. The National Finance Committee would seem to focus on ANC fundraising issues. It is convened by Mendi Msimang, the ANC treasurer general.
Msimang and Motlanthe accompanied Majali to Iraq in December 2000. This was when Majali’s then-company, Montega Trading, signed an oil transaction with the regime of Saddam Hussein under the United Nations Oil for Food Programme.
Oil for Food has been the subject of much controversy, including over the fact that the Iraqi regime bestowed lucrative oil allocations on politicians and political parties — and even a top UN official — to buy international favour.
Last year, when the M&G first wrote about Majali’s Iraqi oil transactions, the ANC denied it had ever “received material assistance from any government or organisation in exchange for ‘diplomatic support’”.
The ANC did not comment in time for publication this week. Majali and Imvume responded through their lawyer, Barry Aaron: “Mr Majali has never had any formal role or held any formal position in any ANC structure. He is a normal party member of the ANC.
“As a party member and from time to time, on an entirely informal basis, he has provided advice to various structures within the ANC, including to the secretary general.
“There has never been any tripartite arrangement between PetroSA, our clients [Imvume and Majali] and the ANC. Imvume’s relationship with PetroSA was in terms of arms-length commercial contractual arrangements. This is independent of and unrelated in any way to any relationship which either of our clients have with the ANC.
“That Mr Majali may have provided informal economic advice to the ANC … or that our clients may have contributed to the ANC, has nothing whatsoever to do with Imvume’s commercial relationship in the ordinary course of its business with PetroSA.”
After the M&G wrote the original stories about the Iraqi transactions early last year, it was sued for defamation in two separate actions by Imvume and Majali, and by the ANC, Motlanthe and Msimang. The Sunday Times was also sued by both sets of parties, and the Cape Argus by Imvume and Majali.
Motlanthe on Monday told the media that the ANC had “a court date” with the M&G over last year’s articles. In fact, the ANC has not yet obtained a court date for the matter to be heard, more than a year after the suit was first filed. The matter Imvume and Majali versus the M&G is set down to be heard in November.