Zuma at the forefront of secret nuclear deal: President Jacob Zuma worked closely with Russian President Vladimir Putin to mastermind the secret nuclear deal, reported the Mail & Guardian on Friday. According to the report, highly placed governing party sources have placed Zuma at the head of the R1 trillion nuke deal. The publication quoted a senior African National Congress official as saying the deal was discussed and negotiated by Zuma and Putin during the Brics (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) summit in Brazil in July. The source said Zuma ironed out details of the agreement during a highly secret visit to Moscow last month. A second high ranking ANC official said the details of the deal were finalised during Zuma’s trip to Russia in August. The sources claim Zuma went on to instruct energy minister Tina Joemat-Pettersson to sign the deal. The nuclear deal came into the spotlight on Monday when Joemat –Pettersson announced the formation of a strategic partnership between South Africa and Russia to build a large scale nuclear power plant in South Africa. The Russian State Atomic Energy Corporation (Rosatom) sent out an identical statement saying this agreement lays the foundation for a large scale nuclear plant procurement and development programme in South Africa, which could end the country’s energy woes. These power plants will be built in South Africa, but installed with Russian VVER reactors. But, the Department of Energy and the Nuclear Energy Association of SA (Necsa) said there was no procurement agreement but a country-to-country framework agreement. Necsa said this was necessary for a commercial relationship over nuclear power. ANC sources have now claimed Zuma hid the deal from cabinet ministers and only informed his most faithful confidants. Sources also said that the minister and Zuma did not inform the ANC’s national executive committee (NEC) of the impending deal. Speculation is rife regarding the contents of the agreement as it is feared that it might not be much different from the draft agreement circulated by Russia in May last year. In the draft, Russia sought to limit South Africa from acquiring Russian reactor technology and giving itself exclusive say over the auxiliary construction contracts. It also included a 20-year veto on South Africa doing business with any other nuclear vendor countries; and made South Africa exclusively liable for all nuclear equipment procured from Russia as soon as it left that country. “These clauses either flouted sections of our Constitution, which guarantees an open, competitive and transparent bidding processes, or they were not in our national interest,” the source was quoted as saying. Since word of the deal appeared in the media, the Democratic Alliance (DA) called for the deal’s details to be made public. The party has also called on Parliament’s energy portfolio committee to subpoena Joemat-Pettersson to appear before it and produce a full copy of the agreement, as well as provide clarification on Rosatom’s public statements. The department of energy declined to comment on the allegations, and presidency spokesperson Mac Maharaj could not be reached. photo credit: linh.m.do via photopin c
Posted on: Sun, 28 Sep 2014 07:47:35 +0000
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