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‘Zuma undermined Constitution by establishing SSA through proclamation’

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Former Head of South Africa’s Secret Service, Mo Shaik says former President Jacob Zuma undermined the Constitution by establishing the State Security Agency through proclamation as opposed to through legislation.

Shaik has been testifying at the Commission of Inquiry into State Capture in Parktown, Johannesburg about the structure, composition and functions of various intelligence services between 1997 and 2009.

“We were not accorded the kind of respect that should normally (be) accrued to persons with that experience and to allow that experience to shape the policies that were unfolding and that was rather unfortunate, and it led to a situation which became untenable. So, in my view, it was a combination of inexperience in intelligence affairs and driven by a narcissistic consolidation of power.”

Shaik says during the negotiations and drafting of the Constitution it was never envisaged that there would be a Ministry of State Security. He told the Commission that he contributed to the drafting of Chapter 11 on the Constitution which outlines the principles that governs national security.

Shaik says the new structure established in 2010, led to the breakdown of coordination between different agencies.

“The principle of coordination in my view has been undermined. Now, we go back to a situation where each intelligence service whether it’s security, the civilian intelligence service or the police or the military, you are starting to see the breakdown of the coordination, which is what the constitution intended. So, from the time these changes were made, you effectively have no coordination and in the absence of coordination, you would have frolics of your own; the phenomenon of disinformation, information peddlers and bogus informants.”

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