Real rogue unit: How SA's spies became the servants of Zuma and the ANC
In 2014, the State Security Agency (SSA) launched one of its most successful insurgency operations when it managed to disseminate fabricated information, plant rumours and infiltrate the media in order to disembowel the SA Revenue Service (SARS), and more specifically, its High-Risk Investigation Unit (HRIU).
The success of the operation, in order to serve criminal elements in the government and the ANC, and to advance the political project of former president Jacob Zuma and his network of patronage and thievery, saw the conception of the so-called "rogue unit" narrative. It held that the HRIU operated outside of its legal mandate, destroyed lives and gorged itself on public resources.
The SARS "rogue unit" lie was officially buried last year when the Gauteng High Court in Pretoria buried Public Protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane's final attempts to keep it alive. And, despite the Independent Newspaper Group maintaining the fiction, it is dead.
Testimony this week at the judicial commission of inquiry into allegations of state capture, however, exposed the real rogue unit: the SSA. Over the course of four days - it continues on Friday - South Africans were given insight into a range of dirty tricks campaigns targeting the judiciary, media and institutions like SARS. We heard of billions of rands gone missing, insurrection against the Constitution and the rule of law, and spies pressed into the personal service of Zuma, the rogue president.
We are shocked, but not surprised. The SSA operate in total secrecy, with no accountability, and is staffed by ANC apparatchiks. Their loyalty - as SSA DG Loyiso Jafta testified - lay with the person of the president and the minister. And, within that warped world, it was narrowed down even further to a specific ANC faction.
The SSA is a criminal enterprise and the president has not done enough to clean up the mess his party and leadership created. They have compromised national security, defied the Constitution and stolen money. It is an outrage and we must demand accountability.
In this week's Friday Briefing, News24's editor Adriaan Basson examines who the real rogue unit was. Analyst Mpumelelo Mkhabela argues that Cyril Ramaphosa is dealing with the fallout following testimony at the commission in the incorrect way and, finally, author John Matisonn analyses how the spy agency's campaign to interfere in the media bears a likeness to a previous campaign from the country's darker period.
Best,
Pieter du Toit
Assistant Editor: in-depth news and investigations.
The week the REAL rogue unit was finally exposed
With the focus on the so-called SARS rogue unit, it meant the SSA's Special Operations Unit, under the leadership of Thulani Dlomo, could just disappear and fly under the radar. Adriaan Basson argues that Dlomo's unit was, in fact, the real rogue unit.
Now is not the time to try and unify your party, Mr President
Mpumelelo Mkhabela argues that, in light of what is coming out of the Zondo Commission, Cyril Ramaphosa's elevation of unity above honesty is the leading cause of the decline of the ANC - and the country.
Spy agency's media interference mirrors apartheid-era info scandal
Testimony from Sydney Mufamadi at the state capture commission this week reveals that a campaign to influence positive media coverage was conducted under a democratic government. John Matisonn writes that the campaign bears a similar likeness to a campaign run by the apartheid government.
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