The Mail & Guardian is being investigated by police national headquarters in an apparent bid to out the newspaper’s sources of information that Oilgate company Imvume Management diverted R11-million in public funds to the African National Congress.
Signs that the investigation enjoys top priority include:
- It is being conducted by the commercial branch head office at police headquarters in Pretoria, a specialised crime fighting unit.
- A police intelligence front company is assisting in the investigation. The front company is a leftover from the apartheid state’s dirty tricks arsenal.
- Police this week took the highly controversial step of serving a Section 205 subpoena on MWeb, hosts of M&G Online. This appears to undermine earlier agreements between prosecuting authorities and the South African National Editors’ Forum.
M&G editor Ferial Haffajee said on Thursday: “This smacks of an abuse of state resources to shoot the messenger, while the guilty parties in the M&G’s Oilgate exposÃ