De Klerk claim 'uninformed'

2005-12-09 13:36

Cape Town - The F W de Klerk Foundation's claim that a report on corruption during the apartheid-era is an attempt to distract attention from current corruption cases is scurrilous, Public Service and Administration Minister Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi said on Friday.

Fraser-Moleketi, who chairs the National Anti-Corruption Forum (NACF), said the report followed a request by representatives from civil society for "grand corruption" committed under the apartheid regime to be investigated.

The request was made during the 2nd National Anti-Corruption Summit in March in Pretoria, and was based on the National Integrity Systems country study report of Transparency International.

The summit subsequently decided that civil society would prepare a research report on crimes of corruption under apartheid and present these to the NACF for consideration within six months.

A draft report was presented on November 28 but it was made clear by the authors that it still required organisational endorsement from civil society members.

"Our understanding is that civil society is still in the process of finalising the report and a final version is expected in January 2006," she said.

The NACF had accepted the draft report and requested the three sectors, namely the public, business, and civil society, to study the report with a view to deciding on how to address it.

The NACF, through its chairperson, had stated the report would be studied and discussed at the next meeting of the forum by April 2006.

"The NACF hasn't adopted the report and doesn't want to pre-empt discussions around it. The assertion by the F W de Klerk Foundation that this report is an attempt to distract from current corruption cases is unfortunate, uninformed and scurrilous.

"It questions the integrity of the NACF and of the civil society authors of the report," said Fraser-Moleketi.

- SAPA