In June 2026 a retired South African Air Force brigadier general, Portia “Posh” Anyamba, was fined and sentenced in the United States to six months imprisonment after she pleaded guilty to being a foreign agent for South Africa. She’d apparently monitored certain events, secretly on behalf of officials from this country. Anyamba, it turns out, has a fascinating history that spans several countries and includes resistance to the apartheid regime. Daily Maverick’s Caryn Dolley explains.
Reporting by: Caryn Dolley
Edited by: Anda Tolibadi
Filmed by: Joel Seboa
Produced by: Emilie Gambade
Creative input by: Malibongwe Tyilo
Sub-edited by: Kevin Flynn
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In June 2026 a retired South African Air Force brigadier general, Portia “Posh” Anyamba, was fined and sentenced in the United States to six months imprisonment after she pleaded guilty to being a foreign agent for South Africa. She’d apparently monitored certain events, secretly on behalf of officials from this country. Anyamba, it turns out, has a fascinating history that spans several countries and includes resistance to the apartheid regime.
So how did Portia Anyamba go from a freedom fighter, who carved an incredible career path in a male dominated world, to convicted “spy”?
Anyamba, whose nickname is Posh and who previously had the surname Sibiya, was born in Gauteng in 1967 and a few years later her family moved to the Eastern Cape.
Anyamba completed her schooling and was keen to practise medicine.
She was one of the first students to enrol for medicine at the health sciences faculty at what was then the University of Transkei. Things turned political.
According to the SANDF, members of the ANC’s armed wing at the time, uMkhonto weSizwe, known as MK, used to visit Anyamba’s family home at night.
This was how she was introduced to underground ANC activities.
There were raids at the University of Transkei. A student was killed. Apartheid South Africa was a deadly place for black people. Anyamba dropped out of medical school and joined MK.
The SANDF post said that Anyamba had left a note for her family saying: “Please do not look for me, do not go to [the university]. I’ve left South Africa.”
She’d then faced two options: “Join the military in West-Angola or go to school in East Tanzania.” Anyamba chose military camps.
Later, in 1998, she completed her studies in Nigeria and afterwards she joined the air force. She climbed the ranks and in 2000 became the first woman to command a South African Air Force unit.
Anyamba also worked in France before retiring in 2011.
Among her recollections? A phone call from Thabo Mbeki, once South Africa’s president, who’d apparently told her that he was proud of her.
After retiring, Ayamba moved to the US and eventually, around 2023, was employed by a contractor providing services to the US’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
It’s described on its website as “the largest science and energy laboratory for the US Department of Energy”.
Things seemed fine until around 2024.
I reported that the FBI had opened an investigation into “unauthorized conduct undertaken on behalf of foreign governments”. It uncovered that Anyamba had secretly acted as a South African agent. In 2025, she pleaded guilty to that offence and to lying on an application for US government security clearance that could have granted her access to classified information.
Anyamba entered a plea agreement and in June 2026 was sentenced – after my report, the story spread like wildfire.
A section of Anyamba’s plea agreement explains that correspondence between her and others suggested she was “being paid by South African officials to attend think-tank style public functions”.
She would then “provide written reports for the benefit of the Republic of South Africa about those functions and events.”
It was found Anyamba was also linked to a South African State Security Agency official with ties to this country’s embassy in Washington. It’s unclear what happened to that official.
So, what does all this actually mean?
The South African government, as I speak now, has remained mum on this saga.
We know that relations between South Africa and the US have been rocky, especially because of US President Donald Trump’s stance that white Afrikaner people in this country are being intentionally targeted.
Throw a “foreign agent” into the mix and these relations are bound to get rockier.
Through my work on organised crime and surrounding realms, it’s obvious that countries, for various reasons, deploy spooks around the world. But it’s not every day that the curtain is pulled back, giving us a glimpse into these shady arenas.
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