Craig Dodds
THOUGH there will always be unanswered questions about the arms deal and people dissatisfied with the findings of the Seriti Commission of Inquiry, “the story has run its course”, says political analyst Dr Somadoda Fikeni.
After almost two decades of suspicion that soured much of the country’s politics, President Jacob Zuma released the findings of the commission set up four years ago to look into the claims.
It did not find evidence of wrongdoing. But opposition parties slammed it for not considering a report German arms maker Ferrostaal commissioned, which noted “questionable and improper” payments to consultants
The commission had looked into these payments and “not a single iota of evidence was placed before it, showing that any of the money received by any of the consultants was paid to any officials involved in the Strategic Defence Procurement Package, let alone any of the members of the interministerial committee that oversaw the process, or any member of the cabinet that took the final decisions”, Zuma said.
Fikeni said the arms deal saga had been displaced in the public discourse by the Nkandla and Gupta scandals, with verifiable evidence.
Should the opposition continue making an issue of the arms deal, they could be accused of always viewing the government with suspicion, while less enthusiastic about private sector corruption.
“I don’t think it is likely you’ll have unanimity on this. Those who believe that there was circumstantial evidence will still believe there is something that the commission has not dug into,” Fikeni said.
Those implicated in the allegations over the deal, on the other hand, would see the commission’s findings as a vindication and proof of an opposition witch hunt.
Professor Steven Friedman, director of the Centre for the Study of Democracy, said those who believed the arms deal was tainted would, “with considerable justification”, consider the commission to have been a whitewash.
He didn’t see “any chance at all” that the findings would be accepted by those who viewed the arms deal with suspicion.
Like Fikeni, Friedman said the focus in the political arena was now on Zuma and, in that sense, the arms deal didn’t have “huge legs” any more.
“I think the irony is that it will once again be blamed on Zuma, despite the fact that he wasn’t there, to say he was responsible and he was trying to protect the ANC,” Friedman said.
However, it would be very difficult to argue that the government could not have dealt with the matter better, long ago.
“I’ve never heard of a clean arms deal, quite frankly, I don’t think there’s ever been one,” Friedman said.
“So to the extent that if you’re going to have arms deals, they’re going to turn out to have a bad smell about them anyway, from a government point of view what you want is to be seen to be dealing with it in some sort of expeditious way, which they didn’t do.”
While the DA dubbed the Seriti findings a “huge disappointment” and the EFF said the report should be “dismissed and rejected with the contempt it deserves”, the ANC said it “reaffirms its confidence in the credibility of the process and trust that the commission’s report will bring to finality the allegations and claims of wrongdoing in the arms deal”.