R2K calls for the High-Level Panel Report recommendations to be implemented!

In response to the Ministry of State Security’s parliamentary budget vote delivered today, the Right2Know Campaign calls on the Minister to table her entire budget (including the much-abused slush funds that have been the source of so much corruption and malfeasance). We also call on the Minister to provide a clear turnaround strategy for the overhaul and repurposing of the Agency. Valuable time has elapsed since the release of the High-Level Panel Review Report into the state’s intelligence structures. It is now time for the Panel’s recommendations to be implemented.                                                                                     

We reiterate our initial calls for President Ramaphosa and Minister Ayanda Dlodlo, to provide details of the planned reforms they have talked about so that the Panel recommendations can be fully implemented. There must be no political ‘settlement’ and/or concessions that allow those within the intelligence structures – and those with responsibility over them – to wriggle out of being held accountable for obviously illegal and unlawful actions. 

The Panel recommended that “the President instructs the appropriate law enforcement bodies, oversight institutions and internal disciplinary bodies to investigate all manifest breaches of the law, regulations and other prescripts in the SSA … with a view to instituting, where appropriate, criminal and/or disciplinary prosecutions”.

In light of this, we call for the former President Jacob Zuma, former intelligence Ministers Siyabonga Cwele and David Mahlobo as well as former SSA head Arthur Fraser to be charged with defeating the ends of justice, and any other competent charges. The evidence provided in the Panel Report proved that these individuals were central to the illegal spying on civil society organisations as well as the corruption and mismanagement within the State Security Agency (SSA).

Lastly, the Report recommended that the controversial Protection of State Information Bill (popularly known as the “Secrecy Bill’) should be scrapped once and for all. R2K has been calling for this to happen for several years now. We call on President Ramaphosa to set aside, once and for all, this piece of legislation as being contrary to the spirit and the promise of our Constitution. The President knows full well that this Bill is unconstitutional and he now has the opportunity to put words into practice.  

We also urge the office of the Inspector-General of Intelligence (IGI) to act on the complaints that we lodged years ago with his office. We call on the IGI to release the findings of his investigations into our complaints as soon as possible.           

The people of South Africa not only have a right to know, but they also deserve justice.

• Overhaul the entire intelligence community to make a fresh start!
• Implement the recommendations of the panel as soon as possible!

For further comment contact:

Thami Nkosi, Interim Organizer: Secrecy and Securitization: 062 624 5992

Dr Dale McKinley, R2K Activist: 072 429 4089