Michael Masutha met Bosasa CEO Gavin Watson – Agrizzi
The former COO, however, says in his view the meeting was not a success.
PRETORIA, SOUTH AFRICA – MARCH 23: Minister of Justice and Correctional Services, Adv. Michael Masutha during the official launch of the ‘Gallows Exhumation Project’ on March 23, 2016 at the Kgosi Mampuru II Correctional Centre (Gallows Museum) in Pretoria, South Africa. A total of 130 political prisoners were hanged on the gallows of the correctional centre between 1960 and 1990, 47 human remains of these prisoners have been exhumed while 83 of them remain buried in unmarked graves. (Photo by Gallo Images / Beeld / Lisa Hnatowicz)
Former Bosasa COO Angelo Agrizzi on Friday told the commission of inquiry into state capture that Justice and Correctional Services Minister Michael Masutha had met with CEO Gavin Watson in Port Elizabeth around 2015.
Agrizzi says Gavin Watson planned to offer accommodation to ANC members attending a rally in PE around 2015. He says Min of Justice M Masutha was accommodated at one of the Watson's house and then Watson had a meeting with the minister. #StateCaptureInquiry
— State Capture Commission (@StateCaptureCom) March 29, 2019
Agrizzi told the commission that parliament’s chair of chairs, Cedric Frolick, and Watson had arranged the meeting.
“Gavin was excited, he was a kid with toys when he was about to meet with parliamentarians,” Agrizzi told the commission.
However, Agrizzi said though he was not present at the meeting, he believed “it was not a success at all” because Watson had not called him to update him on its success, as he usually did following meetings of such a nature.
The Citizen reported in February that Masutha told the parliamentary oversight committee that he had spent a weekend at Watson’s house, while his deputy said he had paid Bosasa back for security upgrades on his house.
Masutha was responding to a question on whether he had met Watson, saying he met the controversial businessperson at the end of his his three-day stay at Watson’s Port Elizabeth house, when he attended the governing ANC’s Siyanqoba Rally of 2016.
He told the committee he was not aware who the property belonged to, and that he was referred to it by a fellow parliamentarian because he’d struggled to find accommodation.
Watch the proceedings below, courtesy of the SABC:
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(Additional reporting Sipho Mabena)
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