Duarte: ‘ANC doesn’t have arms deal documents for Zuma trial’

The African National Congress (ANC) deputy secretary-general Jessie Duarte has said that the party does not have the documents that would help former president Jacob Zuma in his arms deal trial, the SABC has reported.

As part of his defence strategy, Zuma has written to at least 11 organisations, including the ANC and the Nelson Mandela Foundation. The former president’s legal team alleges that these third parties benefitted from the arms deal.

Jacob Zuma wants documents on arms deal trial

Jacob Zuma wrote to the ANC treasurer-general’s office, seeking a list of payments made from to the ruling party from companies that are alleged to have scored from the multi-billion-rand arms deal from the 1990s. He believes this will help his case and counter the National Prosecuting Authority’s (NPA) claim that he used his political position to benefit from the deal.

However through its lawyers, the ANC said all documents pre-dating 2005 were destroyed as a result of flooding that occurred.

Here’s what the letter to the Nelson Mandela Foundation reads in part:

“In the evidence submitted to the Commission of inquiry chaired by Justice (Willie) Seriti, Colonel Johan du Plooy of the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) and Mr Richard M Young of C121 at the Seriti Commission, in effect both implicated both former president Dr Nelson Mandela and the Nelson Mandela Foundation. Documentary evidence presented by Colonel John du Plooy and Mr Richard Young related to the investigation conducted by the German Public Prosecution office in Germany and the National Prosecuting Authority of South Africa which revealed that the Nelson Mandela Foundation may have received payments and/or donations from the German and French companies or consortia that were appointed by the South African government in the strategic defence procurement packages after the awarding of four corvette ship contracts by the South African government to the German Corvette Consortium,”

Zuma’s lawyers to Nelson Mandela Foundation

Zuma faces 16 charges of fraud, corruption, racketeering, and money-laundering related to the controversial multi-billion rand arms deal in the late 1990s. The former president is alleged to have received 783 suspicious payments to the tune of R1.2 million from French arms manufacturer Thales, through his disgraced former financial advisor Shabir Shaik.

The payments are alleged to be bribes, in exchange for protecting Thales from an investigation into how it scored the contract. Zuma has denied the allegations and claims they are politically motivated.