In his day, Lackay, who had worked for SARS for over 11 years and under three commissioners including Pravin Gordhan, Oupa Magashula and acting commissioner Ivan Pillay, was regarded as one of the most efficient and knowledgeable government spokespersons. Lackay had a deep and wide understanding of the institution, the legislative frameworks that governed it as well as how to manage tough media inquiries.

Yet in February 2015, only five months after Tom Moyane had been appointed SARS commissioner, Lackay resigned. His life, Lackay told CCMA arbitrator Joyce Nkopane this week, had become “intolerable” after he had been sidelined and shut out of the loop when a series of reports about an apparent “covert” unit began to appear in the Sunday Times from September 2014.

In March 2015 Lackay made a written submission titled “SARS: This is the inside story” to Parliament’s Standing Committee on Intelligence. Lackay told the committee that Commissioner Moyane was due to address the Standing Committee on Finance and the Joint Standing Committee on Intelligence with regard to events that had unfolded at SARS. Lackay wrote that his submission was an attempt “in the interest of justice and ultimately the public interest that a true version of such events are also placed before the SCOF and JSCI and its members, albeit in writing and not in person”.

For this, SARS and Moyane sued Lackay for R12-million for defamation. The matter was heard in the North Gauteng High Court in November 2016 and judgment has been reserved.

This week SARS once again objected to evidence on the “rogue” unit being presented at Lackay’s CCMA hearing. In October last year, when the CCMA hearing first kicked off, SARS applied to have evidence with regard to the covert unit ruled inadmissible. SARS had argued that the documents, titled “Project Snowman”, were not relevant to Lackay’s CCMA case. The SARS application was overruled.

Project Snowman is a dossier compiled by former SARS official, Mike Peega, and has been in the public domain since 2009. It was Peega – who was dismissed from SARS after he was caught rhino poaching – who first advanced the “rogue unit” narrative. It was taken up later by attorney Belinda Walter, a triple agent for State Security, British American Tobacco and its rival company Carnilinx, as well as others who appeared to regard it as a convenient excuse.

Lackay said this week that he had resigned from SARS under duress as it had become untenable for him to associate himself with events that were unfolding at the revenue service. The former spokesperson has asked the CCMA to pay him 12 months salary as compensation.

Lackay explained that in January 2015 Luther Lebelo, who was an executive in SARS employee relations and human resources at the time, had been brought in to communicate with the media with regard to allegations of a “rogue unit” and a string of suspensions of senior staff in the aftermath of reports published in the Sunday Times. Lebelo made headlines recently when he wrote a letter to Business Day in November last year, “in his personal capacity”, describing credit ratings agencies as “economic gangs”.

Lebelo was later supported by Zuma and Gupta family supporter Mzwanele Manyi, president of the Progressive Professional Forum.

This week Lackay testified that he had been instructed by SARS chief operating officer, Jonas Makwakwa, on February 1 that Lebelo would from then onwards act as the spokesperson on the suspensions at SARS.

“I submit that such an instruction was clumsy, not properly considered and it was in effect a proxy to prevent me from speaking or answering inquiries from the media, from the national research group, or the so-called rogue unit. The problem for me was in that scenario I was still the first point of call for many journalists and at times I was in a position where I could not respond to them in a meaningful or informed manner and had to refer them either to Mr Lubelo, or say I couldn’t assist them,” Lackay testified.

Lackay also explained how the relationship between him and Moyane became nonexistent with Moyane moving to an office further away from his [Lackay’s] and ignoring e-mails from Lackay.

Moyane and Makwakwa had met with SARS staff in January 2015 and informed them they were there to “clear the air”.

Makwakwa was suspended in September last year after the Financial Intelligence Centre flagged a number of “suspicious” cash deposits of around R1.2-million made to his personal bank account as well as that of his lover, SARS employee, Kelly-Ann Elskie. The FIC had alerted Moyane to the payments in May but the commissioner “sat” on the information until September.

Moyane also allegedly shared the report with Makwakwa. In December Corruption Watch filed criminal charges against Moyane for failing to report the matter to the Hawks as he is obliged to do under the Prevention of Corrupt Activities Act. In the meantime, SARS has employed the private legal firm Hogan Lovells to probe the matter.

What is curious, in retrospect and with the full knowledge of events that have unfolded since the entire executive was purged, is that neither Moyane nor anyone else at SARS appeared to feel the need to investigate who, inside SARS, was leaking information to the Sunday Times.

Also, the charges against the unit that were published in the Sunday Times were serious and included claims that members had broken into President Jacob Zuma’s home and had planted listening devices, that they had run a brothel and had access to a R500-million slush fund.

The Hawks as well as the NPA seemed strangely listless about such a major and, dare we say, arguably treasonous breach of the law and the undermining of a key state institution. Both agencies in fact did not act at all. Further serious allegations that members of the covert unit had murdered SARS employees Leonard Radebe and George Nkadimeng – who both died in separate car accidents – were also not investigated and no witness statements were taken or evidence gathered.

Moyane too was strangely mute about the series of Sunday Times articles. The commissioner made no apparent attempt to seal the constant leaks which the newspaper said had emanated from SARS officials, former officials and intelligence operatives.

The question no one, including Moyane and the Hawks, asked at the time was who were these officials, what was their motive and who stood to benefit from their claims.

Did these leaks then serve a particular purpose?

The Sunday Times was later forced by the Press Ombudsman to retract the articles and to apologise. The Ombud also found that the paper had breached the press code.

Four probes including the Khanyane and the Sikhakhane enquiries (instituted by Pillay before he left), the Kroon Commission of Enquiry as well as the costly KPMG report have still not been publicly released.

It is well known that SARS investigators, while Pillay was still acting commissioner, were probing several politically sensitive cases. SARS was also chasing tax evaders in the tobacco industry and it was from this sector that the first metaphorical hand grenade was lobbed into the revenue service by BAT’s agent, Belinda Walter, who had embarked on an ill-fated relationship with SARS group executive Johann van Loggerenberg.

Moyane’s swift action in the aftermath of the untested covert unit allegations – the immediate suspension of senior officials – is in marked contrast to his response to Makwakwa’s alleged transgressions. Moyane and Makwakwa were also quick to sue the amaBhungane investigative unit journalists and the Mail & Guardian for defamation with regards to a report on Moyane and Makwakwa’s role in the restructuring of SARS.

Lebelo too was quick to defend Commissioner Moyane when it was revealed that his nephew, Nhlamulo Ndhlela’s company, Lekgotla Outsourcing, landed a R2.2-billion debt collecting contract with SARS.

The CCMA hearing, which will continue on Friday, might not provide answers to these many pressing and still unanswered questions but it does help to shed some light on the toxic atmosphere at what was once the most formidable state institution.

Several dedicated and hard-working officials and civil servants were frozen and hung out to dry. Also, most seriously, the allegations of the rogue unit have also been used to hound Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan throughout 2016 until a series of ever-changing charges were finally withdrawn by NPA head Shaun Abrahams in October last year, much to the irritation of Hawks head, Lieutenant-General Mthandazo Ntlemeza.

The SARS rogue unit saga will no doubt go down as one (of many) of the most shameful and tragic chapters in South Africa’s democratic history. The fallout still continues and has served to pollute the entire body politic.

Lackay’s CCMA hearing continues on Friday. DM

Photo: Former SARS spokesperson Adrian Lackay. (YouTube)