Despite an order by former President Sam Nujoma in February, when he opened Cabinet, that a report stemming from a presidential inquiry be made public, and a promise by Prime Minister Nahas Angula to Parliament in May that it would be able to scrutinise the report before year-end, this has not happened.

CABINET DECISION In an interview with The Namibian last week, Angula said Cabinet had decided that the findings could not be made public because the conclusions were "so sweeping without proper evidence to support the conclusions".

"There's a mismatch between findings and evidence; that is really the problem," Angula told The Namibian, when asked why the report was still being kept under wraps.

"The Cabinet felt some of these things should be looked into so that you don't publish this report and give the impression to the public that someone is guilty, who is not guilty ...

you are talking about people's lives.

The public does not have the actual basis on which the report was written and can make the wrong conclusions and that we felt it was not fair to the individuals in the report."

POLICE MUM ON STATE OF PLAY Instead, Cabinet resolved that the Police investigate the allegations further to strengthen the conclusions.

He said the report's recommendations were not well supported and "evidence was thin".

"As a Government we don't want to put something in the public which accuses people and we don't have proper, solid evidence", Angula said.

The Namibian could, however, not establish with certainty whether the report had in fact reached the Police.

Police spokesperson Chief Inspector Hieronymus Goraseb said the Police could not comment.

The SSC presidential inquiry of 2002-03 was handed to the Police in January and, at the time, the Police confirmed that they were studying the evidence related to theft, corruption and fraud at the SSC.

Goraseb would also not say how advanced the investigations into the SSC report were or whether anybody stood to be prosecuted yet.

The DBC-Amcom inquiry was concluded a year ago.

Angula called for patience on the part of investigators, saying it was well known that the Police operated under constraints because of a lack of funding and inexperienced investigators.

"These investigations take long if you want to have a proper case.

It doesn't necessarily mean that people are sitting on it, they are investigating," said Angula.

The findings and recommendations of the DBC-Amcom report were adopted by the previous Cabinet at its first session for the year on February 18.

At that session, Cabinet also decided that an ad hoc committee would work out a strategy for implementing the recommendations contained in the report.

Angula said the committee found that the recommendations had "provoked" further investigation because of a lack of evidence to support the findings.

To date, no findings of any presidential commission of inquiry since Independence have been publicised.

Some months ago, the report on the Roads Authority (RA) and Road Funds Authority (RFA) inquiry of 2003 was leaked to various media, which published some of the findings.

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