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FIRST ZONDO REPORT Former State President Jacob Zuma established The Judicial Commission of Inquiry into Allegations of State Capture, Corruption and Fraud in the Public Sector including Organs of State in January 2018. By Peter Bagshawe
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he Commission is better known as the Zondo Commission (titled after the Commission Chairperson, Deputy Chief Justice Raymond Zondo) and served as a public inquiry to investigate allegations of state capture, corruption, and fraud in the public sector in South Africa. The Commission arose from the ‘Captured State’ report by then Public Protector, Thuli Madonsela and, following a failed application to have Madonsela’s report overturned, then Chief Justice Mogoeng Mogoeng selected Zondo as Chair of the enquiry. In the course of hearings, an estimated petabyte of data and some 159,100 pages of evidence was accumulated after interviewing 278 witnesses. The Zondo Commission is estimated to have cost around R1 billion over a period of almost 4 years.
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The 1st Report of the Zondo Commission was handed to State President Ramaphosa on 4 January 2022 and comprised 855 pages dealing with three principal areas of the Inquiry: being South African Airways (SAA), the South African Revenue Service (SARS) and The New Age newspaper. The 2nd and 3rd Reports are due to be released at the end of January and end of February respectively. At this stage it may be as well to affirm that the investigation of state capture was geared around nine broad areas arising from Madonsela’s report. For the purposes of the following discussion, state capture is regarded by me as a course of action involving systemic political corruption in which private interests or individuals significantly influence government processes in contravention of legal norms to achieve economic advantage.
SECURITY FOCUS AFRICA DECEMBER 2021/JANUARY 2022
South African Airways former Board Chairperson, Dudu Myeni, featured prominently and the report recommended that she be prosecuted for fraud and corruption together with a number of other members of South African Airways boards and associated companies. The report refers to money diverted and laundered to Myeni from the Free State Provincial Government, systematic weakening of governance and procurement processes, the creation of a climate of fear and intolerance at the carrier and poor operational decisions that led to a decline of the South African Airways’ financial position. Additionally, reference to corrupt and negligent management is contained in the report in respect of Yakhe Kwinana, the former chairperson of South African Airways Technical, Advocate Nontsasa Memela,
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