After four years, 400 days of hearings and, over 300 witnesses, the State Capture Inquiry has found that there was in fact state capture.
The Judicial Commission of Inquiry into Allegations of State Capture, headed by Deputy Chief justice Raymond Zondo, handed over the first of three parts of its report on Tuesday.
“A fundamental question that this Commission is required to answer is whether the evidence led before the Commission has established state capture,” the report noted.
The full reasons why the Commission made this conclusion will come in part three of the report, it said.
“The evidence led before the Commission covered, amongst others, allegations of state capture, corruption, fraud, irregularities relating to tenders in, among others: South African Airports Company, South African Airways Technical and South African Express; Bosasa; Denel; Eskom; Estina; Prasa; SABC; SARS; State Security Agency; and Transnet.
In the first part released on Tuesday, the commission makes wide-ranging findings in relation to SAA, The New Age and SARS.
The commission has made recommendations that criminal charges be instituted among a number of key role players in state capture including, former SAA chairperson Dudu Myeni, former Transnet CEO Brian Molefe, former Eskom CEO Collin Matjila and the Guptas- among others. The report recommends actions against former SARS commissioner Tom Moyane.
President Cyril Ramaphosa said he will only take action once he received all three reports and will table a plan of action to parliament by 30 July 2020. So far, former president Jacob Zuma has not been spared the wrath of the commission for his role in facilitating state capture.