Arms Deal Claims: SA Parliament’s Inadequate Reponse To State Capture Due To Limited Resources

Former Speaker of the National Assembly Baleka Mbete told the State Capture Commission yesterday that she didn’t act on a document outlining corruption in the 1999 multibillion-rand Arms Deal because it was anonymous and that the arms deal case had already been through thorough investigation.

In 2018 Zuma was in the dock on fraud, corruption and money laundering charges related to the Arms Deal that had been controversially withdrawn on the eve of the 2009 election that brought the then ANC president to the Union Buildings. Many argue that the 1999 Arms Deal officially the Strategic Defence Procurement Package prepped the ground for State Capture. Reiterating her earlier testimony about the Arms Deal corruption claims, she said it was not possible to act without a name to the claims as there was a process, a programme, and structures. The arms deal case is another charge laid upon former President Jacob Zuma, and it is not a new case. In different interviews with former President Thabo Mbeki about the arms deal, he said there was no arms deal, it never existed.