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- Former ANC MP Vincent Smith briefly appeared in court Thursday after his arrest on corruption charges.
- The indictment reveals that Smith will be charged with corruption (improper gratuity) and fraud for allegedly failing to declare the benefits to Parliament.
- The Bosasa company, accused of corruption, paid R671,000 to Smith’s company and installed a security system in his house for free.
By failing to report payments and gifts received from Bosasa, former ANC MP Vincent Smith stripped Parliament of its ability to conduct proper oversight of multi-million dollar state contracts, the state alleges.
A severe 39-page indictment by the head of the Investigative Directorate (ID) of the National Prosecutor’s Office, the defender Hermione Cronje, has exposed the State’s case against Smith and his co-defendant, Angelo Agrizzi.
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Agrizzi, the former Bosasa boss turned whistleblower, did not appear in court along with Smith because he was ill, but was charged with one count of corruption for allegedly facilitating payments totaling R671,000 to Smith’s company, Euro Blitz, in 2015 and 2016..
Another bonus was the installation of a CCTV and security system at his home in October 2015, for an estimated value of R200,000.
Smith received bail of R30,000, but maintained his innocence, saying that the State could not prove that he unfairly influenced either party.
The indictment shows, however, that the State will set out to prove that it was Smith’s inaction, as a result of the bonuses paid by Bosasa, rather than his undue influence on others, that resulted in his failure to fulfill his duties and hold him accountable. government officials and Bosasa.
It shows that Agrizzi allegedly made the payments on behalf of or under the instructions of Bosasa’s boss, Gavin Watson, who died in August last year.
The ‘integrity of the National Assembly’ undermined
While ID and Cronje have brought other cases to court, notably Regiments Capital’s attempted recovery of funds, this represents their first criminal case against a politician.
It is a remarkable achievement of the central purpose of the identification establishment to put the collar on the state’s capture of perpetrators of corruption.
“It cannot be denied that corruption threatens to bring to its knees practically everything that we value and value in our hard-won constitutional order,” Cronje writes in the preamble to the indictment, citing, in part, a ruling by the president of the Mogoeng Supreme Court. Mogoeng.
“It blatantly undermines the democratic spirit, the institutions of democracy, the rule of law and the fundamental values of our nascent constitutional project. It fuels mismanagement and public fraudulence and endangers the ability of the State to fulfill its obligations to respect , protect and promote and fulfill all the rights enshrined in the Bill of Rights. When corruption and organized crime flourish, sustainable development and economic growth are stunted. And, in turn, stability and security are put at risk of society, “continues Cronje.
Then lay out the charges.
Smith and Agrizzi each face a corruption charge for payments and the installation of the security system at Smith’s home in Roodepoort. Smith faces an additional charge of fraud for failing to report the money and gifts to Parliament, as he was legally required to do.
Cronje states that by not testifying, Smith undermined the “position and integrity of the National Assembly (NA)” and prevented NA from properly performing its duties.
The case against Smith
Cronje states that between 2004 and 2006, the Department of Correctional Services (DCS) awarded four contracts to Bosasa worth more than one billion rand and details how Smith’s opposition and interest in the Bosasa contracts declined.
This included the supply and installation of televisions, access control and CCTV systems and, in particular, a contract to provide meals to prisoners throughout the country.
Former President Thabo Mbeki signed a proclamation for the Special Investigation Unit (SIU) to investigate the contracts in 2006, an investigation that the SIU ended in 2009.
The SIU recommended criminal charges and disciplinary proceedings against several Bosasa employees, including Agrizzi, then-Commissioner of Correctional Services Linda Mti, and the department’s chief financial officer, Patrick Gillingham.
Agrizzi, Gillingham, Mti and other members of Bosasa’s staff, namely Andries van Tonder and Frans Vorster, were finally charged with fraud and corruption related to the 2004 and 2006 contracts last year.
Smith, Cronje claims, was initially concerned about the SIU investigation into bid fraud and “expressed horror” at the findings presented to the Correctional Services Portfolio Committee (PCCS), which was chaired, by the then head of the SIU , defender Willie Hofmeyr.
Smith was present at the committee meetings where “it was stated that Bosasa was involved in the SIU report and pledged on behalf of the PCCS to investigate further after the report is finalized.”
Change of attitude towards Bosasa
“Notwithstanding SIU’s recommendations, the contracts between Bosasa and the department continued until the last of them was canceled in February 2019,” the indictment read.
Cronje states:
While the SIU investigation, as well as a series of press reports calling for the government to act against Bosasa, pressured parliamentarians to fulfill their oversight role and scrutinize the actions of the DCS, [Smith]Despite his initial critical stance towards DCS and his relationship with Bosasa, he did little to hold DCS accountable for his continuing relationship with Bosasa.
Smith, he said, showed a marked change in attitude towards Bosasa during the latter part of the fourth Parliament (2009 to 2014) and throughout the fifth Parliament (2014 to 2019) and did not take the concerns about Bosasa when they were raised by the committee. members.
In Dennis Bloem’s committee handover report in 2009, he stated that Bosasa’s contracts should be treated as a priority issue by the incoming committee.
Smith chaired the committee from 2009 to 2014, but his handover report in 2014 did not address any of the concerns related to DCS outsourcing or any matter of relevance to Bosasa or its related companies.
He is expected to appear in court again on October 14.
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