Website to battle secrecy bill

While the ANC is forging ahead with its controversial secrecy bill, a group of former South Africans is opposing the ruling party head-on by setting up a website for whistle-blowers.

Adding to the revolt, about 41300 people have, in less than a week, signed the first of a series of petitions to be submitted to parliament opposing the highly contested Protection of Information Bill.

In a bid to counter the ANC's determination to pass the bill into law, expats in Australia and Scotland are fine-tuning a website that will allow citizens to expose corruption without fear of being persecuted.

The website, sagovleaks.com, is to be launched soon and will mirror the WikiLeaks site - which publishes private, secret and classified documents from anonymous news sources, news leaks and whistle-blowers.

The expatriates - none of whom will reveal his name - are keeping details of the website under wraps for now, but a relative of one, who lives in Sydney, Australia, said the website was in the final stages of construction and might be launched in the next few weeks.

He said the setting up of the website was a direct response to the introduction of the Protection of Information Bill, debate on which was scheduled to be finalised by June 24. The deadline has been extended to allow further discussion by a special parliamentary committee.

Anyone will be able to send classified information to the new website anonymously.

Another website for South African whistle-blowers is zaleaks.com .

This website, much to the impotent rage of the Department of Public Service and Administration, made available to all and sundry the Ministerial Handbook - used by top politicians to justify extravagant expenditure of public money on cars and luxuries - and a copy of the medical report on Schabir Shaik that was used to award him a medical parole.

A petition, jointly initiated by the Right2Know campaign and www.avaaz.org, urges people not to allow the government to take South Africa "back to the dark days of impunity".

"Secrets with a bearing on national security must be determined by an independent panel appointed by parliament and not the minister of state security," the petition says.