The National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) is to broaden an ongoing internal probe to include staff members apparently leaking ”incorrect information” to the media on the fate of Deputy President Jacob Zuma.
In a statement issued on Friday, the authority denied a Mail & Guardian report that it was preparing to charge Zuma following the fraud and corruption conviction of his financial adviser Schabir Shaik.
The final decision rests with National Director of Public Prosecutions Vusi Pikoli, who is still studying the Shaik judgement, it said.
He has not decided whether to prosecute Zuma.
Pikoli is ”very concerned” that incorrect statements are being attributed to NPA employees, the statement said.
”An internal NPA investigation will be broadened to include the latest statements attributed to NPA employees by the newspaper.”
The probe is currently looking an apparent earlier leak of information to the same newspaper about a staff member being investigated for misappropriating money.
”Advocate Pikoli remains committed to upholding high moral and ethical standards within the NPA,” the statement said.
”He is determined to uproot all bad elements within our ranks, which may be undermining public confidence in the NPA by continually leaking classified information or feeding incorrect information to the media.”
Decrying Friday’s report in the M&G as false, misleading and irresponsible, the NPA denied that prosecutors have forwarded a preliminary report on the implications of the judgement, including the question of charges against Zuma, to Pikoli.
”In truth, advocate Pikoli has neither commissioned nor received any such report from prosecutors,” the statement said.
It said it has also noted ”with disgust” insinuations about Pikoli’s participation in this week’s state visit to Chile by President Thabo Mbeki.
”The decision for the NPA to form part of the presidential delegation to Chile was taken in April already, long before there was any judgement by the Durban High Court relating to Schabir Shaik.”
While in Santiago, Pikoli signed a memorandum of understanding with his Chilean counterpart, the statement said. This was for the two countries’ prosecuting authorities to cooperate in such areas as fighting transnational organised crime.
The M&G reported that the NPA was preparing the ground for charges against Zuma, and described Pikoli’s Chilean visit as ”a trip he was not originally scheduled to make”.
Zuma’s financial adviser, Shaik, was sentenced to 15 years in jail on Wednesday after being convicted of fraud and theft involving improper financial dealings with the deputy president.
Judge Hillary Squires ruled that the men had a ”generally corrupt” relationship, and found Shaik guilty of soliciting a R500 000-a-year bribe for Zuma from French arms company Thomson-CSF in return for protection from a probe into South Africa’s multibillion-rand arms deal. — Sapa