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ZIWAPHI • VOL 4 NO 5 • 12 - 25 MARCH 2010

NELSPRUIT

The so-called hit list targeting whistle-blowers in Mpumalanga is portraying the province as "most corrupt and crime infested", the provincial ANC has said in a statement released on Tuesday.

Mpumalanga ANC spokesperson Paul Mbenyane said the people who circulated the hit list wanted to disrupt stability in the province.

"[They] have divided the people of the province and also portrayed Mpumalanga as the most corrupt and crime-infested province where there is no rule of law and morality at all."

Mbenyane said the ANC had no knowledge of any hit lists except what has been reported in the media.

"We therefore distance ourselves from such a list, if it ever existed. We call upon anyone who has any tangible information to come forward and assist law enforcement. Murder is murder and should be condemned in the strongest terms possible, no matter whether the victim is a member of the ANC or not. Law enforcement should do whatever it takes to bring to book the people who are involved in the senseless killings of people in the province."

Mbenyane also denied that people in the ANC were behind the hit list, as has been suggested.

"Any person who can be found to be involved in any criminal activities like murder, such person can not be a member of the ANC no matter what position they can be holding," he said.

Opposition parties in the province have challenged premier David Mabuza to speak out about the hit list.

"Media reports tacitly implicate the premier in knowing about the hit list, so he should break his silence and tell the people of the province what he knows about it," said Zale Prudence Madonsela, COPE's leader in Mpumalanga.

During a 2010 Fifa World Cup media briefing that was held at the Mbombela Stadium on Sunday, Mabuza told journalists that he was not in a position to comment.

"We are not [the] best [people] to comment on that. We have police and intelligence [officials] who are busy investigating the hit list," said Mabuza.

The DA's leader in the province, Anthony Benadie, said the party would write a letter to the auditor-general to request an investigation into all the tenders awarded in the province since Mabuza became premier.

In response, ANC spokesperson Jackson Mthembu said Luthuli House had already deployed a task team to investigate the hit list and accusations of corruption.

"The task team is already in the province looking at the allegations," he said.