[DEBATE] : (Fwd) ANCorruption: more allegations and blame-shifting

[Patrick Bond]

The Mercury

Ngcuka is heading the probe against me, says Selebi
January 11, 2008 Edition 1

Johannesburg: Former National Director of Public Prosecutions Bulelani 
Ngcuka is driving the investigation against him, national Police 
Commissioner Jackie Selebi says.

This allegation is contained in Selebi's founding affidavit lodged with 
the Pretoria High Court, says 702 Eyewitness News.

Selebi has turned to the court to stop the National Prosecuting 
Authority from proceeding against him.

In an urgent application to be brought before the court today, Selebi 
will ask for an interdict preventing criminal prosecution of him.

The move is seen as the latest in a tit-for-tat battle between the 
prosecuting authority and the police.

Gerrie Nel, the head of the Directorate of Special Operations in 
Gauteng, who heads the Scorpions investigation against Selebi, was 
arrested at his Pretoria home this week.

Nel's case was postponed to Monday to give the prosecution time to study 
the docket which contains charges of corruption and defeating the 
administration of justice.

According to the copy of the affidavit, Selebi argues that the 
Scorpions' case against him is nothing more than a scandalous plot.

He says the Scorpions are fighting for their survival and have launched 
a media campaign to discredit him.

They failed to inform him that they were investigating him and Selebi 
maintains he has no idea of what the allegations against him entail.

He says that Ngcuka is the man who is driving the investigation and that 
Ngcuka still actively controls senior members of the Scorpions.

Selebi claims the Scorpions want to discredit his friend Glenn Agliotti 
and tarnish him as a gangster and a drug lord, to discredit Selebi by 
association.

In his court application, Selebi says he wants more information about 
the charges the National Prosecuting Authority intends levelling against 
him as well as those who gave affidavits against him.

NPA spokesman Tlali Tlali said the prosecuting authority would 
"strongly" oppose the application and confirmed that Selebi's legal team 
had served papers on the NPA.

DA safety and security spokeswoman Dianne Kohler Barnard said Selebi's 
action was not that of an innocent man.

"For someone who has always claimed that he is innocent and has been 
quoted as stating that he will never be arrested, he was pretty quick 
off the mark with his application," she said. - Sapa

***

NEW AFFIDAVIT BY AGLIOTTI

Scorpions 'plotted over Selebi'
January 11, 2008 Edition 2

Alex Eliseev

The Scorpions' star witness, Glenn Agliotti, says he never bribed Jackie 
Selebi, dealing a major blow to the case against the national police 
commissioner.

Agliotti also claims he was bullied by the Scorpions into taking part in 
a "political game" to destroy Selebi, ANC President Jacob Zuma and others.

The sensational turnaround is revealed in an urgent application launched 
by Selebi against the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA), which was 
served yesterday.

The application, the reply to which is due today, contains a new 
affidavit signed by Agliotti on January 4.

Until now it was believed Agliotti was going to be the star witness in 
the Scorpions' prosecution of Selebi, with the arrest of the Interpol 
head imminent.

Late last year Agliotti struck a plea bargain with the Scorpions in 
connection with the multimillion-rand drug smuggling case involving 
Stephanos Paparas. He is still on trial for Brett Kebble's murder.

Agliotti now says: "It has always been made very clear by Gerrie Nel 
(Scorpions Gauteng head) and his team that they did not care about the 
Bret Kebble (sic) murder, nor about the Papparus (sic) drug matter as 
their sole and prime objective was to prosecute Selebi."

In his founding affidavit, Selebi charges that his downfall was crucial 
to the Scorpions' plot to avoid being disbanded by June.

The high-profile investigation would show the country there was good 
reason for them to stay.

Selebi also claims the Scorpions raced to arrest him before the ANC's 
December conference, but this did not materialise. His application is 
his first real move - in which he challenges the NPA to show their cards 
- after months of media coverage of his alleged links to the criminal 
underworld.

He also says he is in possession of a 2003 video interview with Agliotti 
in which Agliotti confesses that he misused Selebi's name to obtain 
money for himself from his partners.


Agliotti maintains that: "I was targeted by the DSO (Directorate of 
Special Operations) and the NPA . . . along with National Commissioner 
Jackie Selebi."

He claims the Scorpions set out to discredit him and tarnish him as a 
"gangster and drug lord", and thus discredit Selebi and save the elite 
crime-fighting unit.

"I maintained to the DSO all along that I never ever bribed Selebi at 
all, and I was not going to testify."

Agliotti claims the Scorpions told him, in the presence of his lawyer, 
that they had had an "indaba" meeting to discuss the survival of the 
Scorpions.

The indaba was in fact a meeting held on July 25 attended by Scorpions 
head Leonard McCarthy, Nel, Andrew Leask and other top members.

The decisions taken at the meeting, as well as a media campaign, form a 
strong part of Selebi's application to pronounce the Scorpions' 
investigation mala fide - in bad faith.

Agliotti's also claims that Mike Schultz - the alleged trigger man in 
the Kebble murder - and others have not implicated him in the crime. But 
the Scorpions were desperate and arrested him after turning Clint Nassif 
(Kebble's former security boss) into a state witness.

"I was targeted in a political game which involved the intended demise 
of Zuma, Selebi, (Manala) Manzini (National Intelligence Agency), Billy 
Masetla (National Intelligence Agency), to name but a few (sic).

"Furthermore, I believe that this political project was intended to 
overthrow the law enforcement and intelligence agency of this country 
and to destabilise it, to the benefit of outside forces, namely the CIA 
and FBI (who sponsor the DSO - initiated by Bulelani Ngcuka)."

Agliotti added that to date he had not been asked to make a statement in 
connection with the Kebble murder.