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Mpumalanga Premier David Mabuza’s support has been beefed up today.
At least two MECs – Eric Kholwane (finance and economic development) and Andries Gamede (agriculture) – have arrived at the Northern Gauteng High Court where a R10-million defamation lawsuit filed by Mabuza against former ANC treasurer-general, Mathews Phosa, is about to resume.
ANC Youth League deputy president, Desmond Moela, and provincial and regional ANC leaders have also packed the public gallery. Mpumalanga ANC members arrived at Church Square by bus.
ANC structures have condemned Phosa since he forwarded an intelligence report to the party’s deputy secretary-general, Jessie Duarte.
According to the report, Mabuza was an apartheid spy code-named PN485 who spied on senior ANC leaders – including President Jacob Zuma, Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga and the late Albertina Sisulu – between 1985 and 1993.
The report alleged that Mabuza worked with notorious apartheid killers former Vlakplaas commander Eugene de Kock and security policeman Butana Nofomela.
This week, Mabuza’s main witness, Jan Venter, testified. Venter, Phosa’s former house manager, initially wrote an affidavit to police alleging he saw his boss and his associate, Nick Elliot, fabricating the report.
Venter kissed and made up with Phosa after alleging that Mabuza’s lawyer, Ian Small-Smith, paid him money to lie about Phosa.
But he shifted his allegiances back to Mabuza because, according to his mother Vernie, Phosa did not keep his promise to take care of the family and give him a job.
Phosa senior counsel, Mike Maritz, cross-examined Venter on his two affidavits that he made in an attempt to prove that he was not a credible witness.
Phosa argued that Mabuza brought the action to avoid an investigation about the spy report.
The pro-Mabuza ANC alliance structure has completely alienated Phosa, and Moela has called for his resignation.
Two years ago, ANC and South African Communist Party members assaulted each other in KaNyamazane township using Phosa’s name.
The SACP had invited Phosa as a speaker on a memorial lecture on the life of Joe Slovo and former Mbombela speaker, Jimmy Mohlala, who was assassinated in 2009 while fighting corruption in the R1.2 billion Mbombela stadium tenders.
This angered the ANC in Ehlanzeni since it was not long after Phosa had admitted to submitting the spy report.
