SABC 8 journos cleared on Bosasa 'payment'

A forensic inquiry by Deloitte has found no evidence that any payment was made by Bosasa to the "SABC 8" campaign in 2016.

This comes after an email emerged in January in which a senior Bosasa official instructed his colleagues to donate R100,000 to the crowd-funding effort to help the group of journalists.

That same month, the group of former and current SABC journalists denied any involvement with the state capture-linked company.

"We do not know who the donors were in the crowd-funding initiative, some identified themselves and some remained anonymous," the SABC 8 group said in a statement.

The SA National Editors' Forum (Sanef) requested Deloitte to do a forensic review into the allegations. Sanef had supported the campaign.

"Based on the information obtained and corroborated from a variety of sources and procedures, Deloitte found no evidence that any payment was made by Bosasa or entity or persons related to Bosasa to the SABC 8 campaign in 2016," Sanef said in a statement yesterday.

"This confirms Sanef's initial response that Bosasa did not donate to the cause."

Sanef chairperson Mahlatse Mahlase said she was satisfied that the Deloitte report puts to rest the question of whether Bosasa contributed to the SABC 8 crowd-funding campaign.

Deloitte performed a number of procedures to assess whether funds had actually been received from Bosasa to support the SABC 8 journalists, who were sacked by former COO Hlaudi Motsoeneng for standing up for media freedom, said Sanef.