In 1994 the South African government announced that it intended re-equipping the air force and navy.

Four years later, the arms deal was signed and so began a saga that has seldom been far from the news.

Jacob Zuma (South African President): "`I announced that I would..."

This past week came an announcement South Africans concerned with accountability have waited a long time to hear...

Finally, an official probe into allegations of corruption in the 1999 Strategic Defence Procurement process.

Jacob: "...as the arms deal..."

The President was lauded for appointing three respected judges to the commission.

A few days later, the terms of reference were announced. The Commission would have sweeping powers to search and seize, subpoena witnesses and to compel them to answer questions.

They will look at the fringe benefits, or offsets of the deal, the recovery of losses, whether any person improperly influenced the awarding of contracts and whether fraud and corruption can be proved to justify the cancellation of contracts.

Bongani Bingwa (Carte Blanche presenter): "It's the story that refused to go away. From the initial revelations, a small group of individuals doggedly stuck to their guns demanding an enquiry into the arms deal."

Terry Crawford-Browne (Arms deal activist): "Our whole democracy hangs in the balance. This is now the tipping point."

Terry Crawford-Browne, the economist at the forefront of the investigation from the get-go, wants the contracts cancelled without delay.

Terry: "And that could be done almost immediately given the volume and the admissions of bribery payments that we could cancel those contracts. So that would be a tangible apology to the people of South Africa for what they have gone through for the last 15 years. And that would establish the credibility of the commission."

Bongani: "It all started here. In 1999 Patricia de Lille stood up in Parliament and said she had information that fingered senior politicians for involvement in corruption in the arms deal."

[Carte Blanche archive] Patricia de Lille: "To determine whether certain officials and public representatives are guilty of criminal conduct..."

Back then, Patricia was chief whip for the PAC and she made it her mission to get to the bottom of the allegations of impropriety in the arms deal.

Currently the Mayor of Cape Town, she's on a trip abroad and spoke to us on the phone about the announcement.

[On phone] Patricia: "There's certainly are a lot of speculation about the reasons for it and it does seem it is linked of course to the ANC conference next year. At least we've been calling since the 9th of September 1999 for this commission of enquiry and it is finally going to happen. And that's why we welcome it."

She believes there shouldn't be amnesty from prosecution for any one.

Patricia: "In this instance, it is not political offences that people were involved in. This is simply corruption and when it comes to corruption in a country that is plagued by corruption we'd be sending out a wrong message that you do corruption and you just come clean and you say what you've done, that you will be granted amnesty. People who are alleged to be involved must be charged and prosecuted."

Terry, on the other hand, would prefer a TRC type of investigation.

Terry: "So that we get to the story and it would be quite a short period to get that full disclosure from the Cabinet ministers that led the acquisition; the people who received bribes let them have full disclosure."

We met Terry ten years ago when the rumours of corruption first surfaced.
His information had come from insiders.

Terry: "The ANC intelligence operatives came to me and said you're talking about corruption, we'll tell you where it is. Around the leadership of MK and it wasn't just the arms deal - it was other things it's oil and toll roads and diamond deals and money laundering and that kind of thing. And it was on a scale far bigger that I was talking about."

Bongani: "Over the years a lot has been said to discredit you, perhaps even malign you."

Terry: "Well, it's had its ups and downs but I always been comforted that eventually I'd be vindicated."

Bongani: "What has the personal cost been for you?

Terry: "Well, I spent all my money on investigating and legal fees and so forth."

Bongani: "For Terry Crawford-Browne the arms deal has become something of a personal crusade. He's taken the matter all the way to the Constitutional Court."

And it's widely believed that it's this application that pushed President Zuma into action.

Terry: "The reports are that he told the NEC that he was going to lose the case and therefore he had no option but to agree to a Commission of Enquiry."

"The Devil in the Detail' is the latest book to be published on the arms deal. It's packed with 500 pages of arms deal analysis and was co-authored by Hennie van Vuuren, who's obviously pleased at the latest developments.

Hennie van Vuuren (Institute for Security Studies): "What we have been waiting for is an independent commission led by a panel of retired judges and one that meets certain specific criteria. That it's an open process where the public have access to that it has the power to subpoena individuals both here and potentially from abroad, but equally that the public is allowed to give information. "

He says the appointment of a judicial commission indicates that at last, the corruption unleashed by the arms deal, is being taken seriously.

Hennie: "We need to understand what the actual cost of the arms deal was, were the public misled in that process, by whom, and then we also need to understand what the impact has been."

IDASA's Judith February says the Commission should also look at the original affordability study.

Judith February (Institute for Democracy in Africa): "That said whether South Africa enters into this arms deal would depend on government's appetite for risk and somehow, despite all of the warnings of that report, government went ahead and entered into this deal anyway. And I think we need to understand exactly what happened after the affordability report was tabled and why government didn't head its very clear advice."

Post-democratic South Africa coincided with the end of the Cold War and it was targeted by near bankrupt arms dealers.

Terry: "And you will recall that we had every politician flocking in here saying, 'We love Mandela and the new democracy,' with one hand and were selling weapons with the other."

Soon after Cabinet named its list of preferred suppliers for the deal.

And this is what was ordered:
- Four multipurpose patrol Corvettes at a cost of R6-billion from a German Frigate Consortium;
-Three Diesel Electric Submarines from a second German Consortium at just more than R5-billion;
-30 Augusta Helicopters from Italy at just more than R2-billion;
- 24 Hawk 100s from British Aerospace at a cost of about R5-billion, and;
- 28 Gripen Fighters from Swedish SAAB in conjunction with British Aerospace at a cost of about R11-billion.

The total cost? Around R30-billion paid over a period of 12 years, but this didn't include the financing costs, which upped the figure dramatically.

Bongani: "In rands and cents: what did the arms deal cost South Africa?"

Terry: "We don't actually knows because it's a basket of currencies with huge escalation cost. there's been depreciation of the currency..."

Hennie: "Two years ago we were told that the arms deal only cost SA approximately R47-billion. It had then ballooned from the initial cost of approximately R30-billion. Our research shows that the arms deal has cost the South Africa public over R70-billion. We've probably lost up to 60 000 jobs according to our analysis."

Hennie's calculations are based on the full impact of the arms deal on our economy.

Back then, the procurement package was supposed to have created offsets of approximately R100-bllion and created 65 000 jobs.

Terry: "Offsets are internationally discredited. They're a scam promoted by the armaments industry with complicity of corrupt politicians because it disguises the cost of the acquisitions to fleece the taxpayers."

Judith: "Parliament has shirked it's responsibility in my view and in terms of overseeing those offset programmes and, if you remember, that was the reason why the deal was sold to the South African public."

Hennie: "Very little and almost nothing of that has happened with very few consequences for the individuals and companies involved. And it's led to a series of cover-ups. We've become an increasingly secret State. We argue that a shadow State has emerged in the wake of the arms deal."

Scores of people and companies connected to the arms deal have been named in these headlines.

Terry thinks the inquiry should begin at the top.

Terry: "Within this country the Cabinet sub-committee was headed by Deputy President as he was then, Thabo Mbeki, the Minister of Trade and Industry Alec  Irwin (sic), and the Minister of Finance Trevor Manual (sic), who was responsible for the affordability and the financing of the acquisitions. And then the late Joe Modise and the late Stella Sigcau. There was a cabinet committee of five ministers."

Bongani: "This is not the first official probe into the arms deal. In 2001 the joint investigation team found no individual could be held accountable for what went wrong and as late as last year the head of the Hawks, General Anwar Dramat announced that despite the mountain of evidence the Scorpions had gathered, the investigation would be dropped."

Bongani: "What's actually changed?"

Hennie: "I think that the political terrain has changed and shifted to some extend (sic) where as some months ago I think that President Zuma felt that these issues were untouchable, that nobody would be able to go after them successfully."

With acknowledgements to Carte Blanche.

But the grensvegters are still the grensvegiters.

Aluta.