National Police Commissioner Jackie Selebi visited the Johannesburg home of slain businessman and fraudster Brett Kebble several times last year, mostly for social occasions, three sources with direct personal experience of the visits have told the <i>Mail & Guardian</i>.
Calls made by Brett Kebble in the hours before his death provide a fascinating window on the company he kept.
National Police Commissioner Jackie Selebi is linked to shadowy figures who were associated with slain businessman Brett Kebble. A <i>Mail & Guardian</i> investigation has revealed a web of relationships connecting Selebi to Clinton Nassif and Glenn Agliotti, who worked with Kebble on a series of "security" and other projects.
Oilgate company Imvume Management has constructed what appears to be a deliberate smear against the <i>Mail & Guardian</i>, claiming the newspaper had leaked information to an opposition party in contravention of a high court order. <i>M&G</i> editor Ferial Haffajee and Karjieker this week flatly denied the allegations.
There are fears that the Donen commission investigating South African abuse of the Iraq oil-for-food programme may not regain momentum after public hearings were abandoned as they were about to start. The commission backed down in the face of a Pretoria High Court challenge by a witness it had subpoenaed to testify first. Bad drafting of its powers left it little choice.
The Oil for Food programme may become a focus of the Donen Commission of Inquiry, which starts public hearings on May 8.
As Germany mounts the first prosecution targeting an international nuclear contraband ring, details are emerging of how South Africa was a key base for supplying pariah states. Authorities as far afield as Malaysia, Switzerland, Germany, Pakistan and South Africa were jolted into action after October 2003 when a cargo ship, the <i>BBC China</i>, was searched at an Italian port in a United States-British intelligence operation.
The signature of African National Congress presidency head Smuts Ngonyama on a 2001 friendship pact with Saddam Hussein’s Ba’ath party — beneath that of Oilgate’s Sandi Majali — cements evidence that South Africa’s ruling party backed Majali’s pledges of political support to the embattled Iraqi regime.
Public Protector Lawrence Mushwana has denied that using the same lawyers as the African National Congress in litigation over Oilgate undermines his independence. ushwana, the ANC, Imvume Management and the Mail & Guardian have been locked in legal disputes over the M&G’s Oilgate exposés.
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/ 27 February 2006
Michael Donen, the advocate heading the commission that will investigate South African abuse of the Iraq Oil for Food Programme, has shrugged off a charge that he will not be independent. Recently, Democratic Alliance justice spokesperson Sheila Camerer demanded that President Thabo Mbeki replace Donen.