A DAY before a court was due to hear an urgent case to interdict Public Protector Thuli Madonsela from circulating her provisional Nkandla report, the government abandoned the substance of its case.
What was building up to be a dramatic stand-off between Ms Madonsela and the executive has, following the latest move by the ministers in the security cluster, now fizzled out almost entirely.
The provisional report deals with her investigation into R206m worth of security upgrades to President Jacob Zuma’s private residence at Nkandla, KwaZulu-Natal. Ms Madonsela had been on the verge of releasing her provisional report to a limited group — those affected by it, implicated in it or with an interest in it.
In a replying affidavit filed at the North Gauteng High Court on Thursday, Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa — on behalf of the ministers of public works, defence and state security — said the ministers in the security cluster had gone to court asking for more time to peruse the provisional report, to ascertain whether it contained any breaches of the security of the president or the state.
But because the case was then in any event postponed, they had received the time they sought, he said. This made the part of the application asking for an interdict and for more time "academic", he said.
Also, in her answering affidavit, Ms Madonsela undertook not to release the report until she had considered the security cluster comments and integrated them into the report, said Mr Mthethwa.
"We welcome the undertaking and for this reason the relief sought in prayers 2.3, 2.4 and 3 will not be persisted with," he said.
Those "prayers" refer to where, in the ministers’ initial application, they had asked that the court to order that once Ms Madonsela had received their comments, they would be afforded a second opportunity to look at the "revised" provisional report and comment on it again.
The only issue remaining to be argued on Friday is the costs of the application, said Mr Mthethwa.
Meanwhile, Parliament’s intelligence committee has effectively justified the money spent on upgrading Mr Zuma’s home.
A public works task team investigated the spending but its report was classified as secret and sent to Parliament’s joint standing committee on intelligence, where it was debated in secret.
The report on these deliberations was tabled in Parliament on Thursday.
- BDLive
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