President Thabo Mbeki could face more pressure over the next few months after the Mail & Guardian learned that certain supporters of Jacob Zuma are informally building a case against the president.
The aim of the pressure would be to force him to agree to a general amnesty for those with dirty hands in the multibillion-rand arms deal or face having to explain himself in court.
The M&G reported last week that German investigators are also looking into evidence that could implicate Mbeki.
Although none wanted to be quoted, the M&G this week spoke to eight African National Congress (ANC) leaders at the national and provincial levels, as well as officials at the ANC headquarters, who confirmed that a group of national executive committee (NEC) members are collecting information that is aimed to force Mbeki to agree to blanket amnesty for everyone involved in the arms deal. This move will ensure that everyone, including Zuma, is cleared of all wrong-doing.
Zuma is due to appear in the Pietermaritzburg High Court in August and his supporters are threatening that Mbeki will be part of his witness list in court if the president does not comply with demands for a full disclosure on the arms deal.
Contingency plans to appoint ANC deputy president Kgalema Motlanthe as president by the Zuma camp are already firmly in place to ensure that there is no leadership void if Zuma is found guilty.
The ANC scrambled to deny reports that Mbeki was told by NEC member Tokyo Sexwale to come clean on the arms deal.
This week, NEC members confirmed to the M&G that Sexwale raised the issue at the meeting, but was told that he was ”out of line” by raising it and should take it to the subcommittee set up to collect information on the controversial arms deal.
Sexwale was ”remorseful” after being hauled over the coals, an NEC member said.
The campaign to get Mbeki to talk openly about the arms deal is the only way the ANC will be able to put the arms deal saga behind them.
”He must understand that the ANC is in dire need of the truth. A full disclosure is wanted from the president [Mbeki],” an ANC official close to the process says.
The first part of the strategy is to establish the facts from a report that an ad hoc sub-committee on the arms deal is compiling at the request of the NEC.
A special intelligence report which contains information on Mbeki’s involvement has been distributed to some NEC members to aid this process.
”We are now getting an idea what his role was in the arms deal,” another NEC member from Gauteng said.
Step two is to demand full disclosure from those involved, which will start with Mbeki because he was chair of the arms deal subcommittee in Cabinet.
The ANC would then have grounds to appeal to him to declare a general amnesty for everyone involved in the arms deal.
”As a deployee of the organisation the president should know it is best to come clean. He has to decide whether he wants to disclose the truth in front of his comrades or whether he wants to do it in court.”
Mbeki might also be asked to be a witness for Zuma in his upcoming corruption trial. Zuma’s lawyer, Michael Hulley, told the M&G this week that there is no list of witnesses yet which will act in Zuma’s defence and therefore could not confirm whether Mbeki will be part of it.
Mbeki has not been directly approached regarding the amnesty issue and he was not in attendance when Sexwale raised allegations of his involvement in the arms deal at in the NEC meeting of last week.
The threat of being called as a witness at Zuma’s trial is ostensibly a way to force him to open up and then be more open to declare an amnesty on the arms deal. The threat of an investigation by the post-2009 government into Mbeki’s role in the arms deal is also being raised by the same Zuma supporters.
One NEC member traditionally aligned to Mbeki said that Mbeki knows he is not above the law. ”If he is implicated, he needs to go to court.”
Although the subcommittee on the arms deal is looking at the deal in broad terms, it is felt by the Mbeki detractors that he should be held accountable for the controversy that continues to follow the ANC.
An NEC member from KwaZulu-Natal said, however, that evidence needs to be collected first before anyone will be brought to book. ”We can’t come out and say these things until we can present evidence.”
ANC spokesperson Jessie Duarte told the M&G that such a campaign does not exist.