Phala Phala Report: Panel did what it was required to do by National Assembly members, says Retired Justice Ngcobo

Retired Chief Justice Sandile Ngcobo says their job as the independent panel into the Phala Phala scandal was to interrogate the information that members of the National Assembly wanted them to.

He was reacting to questions about their fitness to probe the matter.

“Those were the rules made by the National Assembly and they could not go beyond that. Let me clear that perception once and for all," he said.

He explained the decision why the panel sought an extension from the Speaker to the end of November.

This was required to gather more information from political parties.

He said the EFF, UDM and ATM gave his panel the required information and it was sent to President Cyril Ramaphosa for his response.

This would have required time as they needed to ensure all that information would be in the report that was given to the Speaker on Wednesday.

Justice Ngcobo also spoke out against suggestions that the panel would have to call on the Hawks to probe Ramaphosa. He said this wasn’t the way the panel worked.

He said he was perturbed when someone went on television to say if the panel didn’t call on the Hawks it would have failed in its job.

“Someone went on television and said if this panel does not call the Hawks, it would not have done its job. Let me make this quite clear and firmly that is not our job.

“Our job was to interrogate the information that members of the National Assembly saw fit to present to us. That is what the rules by the national assembly required us to do. We could not go beyond that,” said Justice Ngcobo.

IOL