Johannesburg – Special Recognition Prizes have been awarded to four South African whistleblowers at the Blueprint for Free Speech 2022 Whistleblowing awards.
The South Africans awarded have been pivotal in drawing attention to wrongdoing in the police service, event organisers explained.
They include Cynthia Stimpel who blew the whistle on a corrupt deal at South African Airways (SAA) exposing her to surveillance and dismissal before she was vindicated by the Zondo Commission; Athol Williams who made disclosures about US-based consultancy Bain & Co which formed a central plank of the Zondo Commission’s investigations; Bianca Goodson, whose brave public disclosure exposed the corrupt activities of the Gupta family; and 15-year veteran of the police force Patricia Mashale who reported corruption where she worked in the police firearms department. Mashale is currently living in hiding, in fear for her life.
The Blueprint for Free Speech prizes and wider work have a huge impact. The 2020 winner, Bernard Collaery, who won the prize for his support and advocacy for the rights of the Timorese people and justice for their fair access to their own natural resources, had criminal charges against him dropped after winning the prize.
This is the first-ever majority female list, with the recipients living across South Africa, Australia and the UK. The recipients’ disclosures have had a global impact, revealing serious wrongdoing across the spectrum: from war crimes to financial corruption and police crimes.
There will be a celebration of the recipients’ stories on Byline TV and it will also be available to watch on YouTube on December 15 from 7pm GMT. It will be hosted by BBC journalist Razia Iqbal with all five winners being interviewed.
The overall aim of the awards is to spotlight individuals who have opposed corruption, political collusion, and professional misconduct. The £20,000 total prize money will be shared between the recipients, including the four recipients from South Africa.
This year’s winners were chosen by a panel of three judges: Lady Sue Woodford-Hollick OBE, award-winning former investigative television journalist and current businesswoman; James Catlin, a former finance journalist and now Australian barrister with particular expertise in fraud, media law, unfair trade practices and protected disclosures; and Dr. Suelette Dreyfus, award-winning writer and academic and Executive Director of Blueprint for Free Speech.
The International Prize was awarded to David McBride who is a British permanent resident and Australian citizen. McBride is a lawyer serving Australian Special Forces as well as a former Captain in the British Army. He disclosed allegations of war crimes and was arrested in 2018 and charged. He is awaiting a criminal trial in 2023. He faces a potential life sentence for breaches of the Defence Act.
Lady Hollick OBE, former investigative journalist and a member of this year’s judges panel, said that McBride’s story calls government to account saying that war crime allegations must be properly investigated, not swept under the carpet, regardless of which country the perpetrators may be from.
“McBride’s disclosures are timely; we’re seeing international judicial investigations of alleged war crimes beginning in Ukraine. Yet, how can we justly prosecute any war crimes unless we investigate all of them?” she said. “There is no moral high ground for countries that pick and choose which war crimes to ignore and which to prosecute,” she said.
Of the four South Africans who received special recognition prizes, Stimpel is living in Johannesburg; Williams is currently based in Oxford, UK; Goodson is also in Johannesburg; and Mashale is in an undisclosed location in Africa – in hiding for her own safety.
Stimpel, Williams and Goodson provided essential evidence about whole-of-state corruption affecting everything from the national air carrier, South African Airways, to the state revenue service. All suffered severe retaliation, including the loss of their careers and in some cases personal safety.
Stimpel ran the treasury department of South African Airways (SAA) when she blew the whistle on a corrupt deal that made her the target of retaliation. She was vindicated in June 2022 when the Zondo Commission of Inquiry into state capture released its findings. “Whistleblowers like Ms Stimpel are the final defence against corruption and state capture taking hold in SOEs,” the Zondo report concluded, lauding her commitment to stand up for what was right “at great personal cost to herself”.
Meanwhile, Williams’ disclosures about US-based consultancy Bain & Co also formed a central plank of the Zondo Commission’s investigations. He was a business strategy advisor and lecturer in business ethics at the University of Cape Town when he blew the whistle on unethical and potentially corrupt practices by US-based consultancy Bain & Company in South Africa, for whom he worked from 1995 to 2010.
At the Zondo Commission of Inquiry into state capture, Williams testified how Bain had forged a secretive personal relationship with the then president, Jacob Zuma. He provided evidence that Bain had masterminded what turned out to be a highly destructive restructuring plan for the revenue service that led to an exodus of skilled senior officials, weakening its ability to fight corruption. He also provided documents outlining how Bain proposed reshaping other sectors of the South African economy, including energy and infrastructure, in a way that could aid corruption.
Of all the witnesses who testified about the revenue service, the Zondo Commission singled out Williams in its appreciation for the evidence he presented, and for rejecting “numerous attempts from Bain & Co to give him large sums of money in return for his silence”.
Williams now lives in exile while continuing to speak out against corruption in South Africa and demanding those responsible be held accountable.
In addition, Goodson’s brave public disclosure exposed the corrupt activities of the Gupta family. She headed the management division of a South African financial advisory firm, Trillian Capital. Trillian was owned by Salim Essa, a close associate of the powerful Gupta family. The Guptas used their relationship with the former president, Jacob Zuma, and his family to secure shady government contracts in South Africa.
Blowing the whistle has taken a heavy toll on Goodson. In an interview in 2021, she said it had led to the end of her marriage and made her unemployable, forcing her to rely on her elderly parents to survive. She suffers from depression and has tried to commit suicide twice.
Meanwhile, Mashale was an administrative clerk working in the police firearms department in the Free State. In December 2020, she reported her concerns to the former national police commissioner, General Khehla Sitole. Sitole referred the case to the head of the priority crimes division in the Free State, who appointed a task team to investigate.
According to Mashale, her complaint found its way back to the very same provincial managers she had blown the whistle on, who then retaliated. One of the police generals she had implicated opened a harassment case and obtained a protection order against her. Police officials investigating the case then seized her phone while she was at work, using what she says was a fake warrant. Next, she found herself under surveillance by police officers in unmarked cars.
James Catlin, barrister, chairperson of Blueprint for Free Speech and a member of this year’s judges panel, said: “2022 was the year the Zondo Commission published its conclusions. This has been an important, almost unprecedented effort by a country facing major governance problems to confront and seek to resolve them through the democratic process.
“As the inquiry itself acknowledged, this reckoning could never have been achieved without the contribution of whistleblowers from different walks of life. Bianca Goodson, Cynthia Stimpel and Athol Williams were all vindicated by the Zondo Commission and did an invaluable service to their country in coming forward.
“We recognise that the situation for South Africa’s whistleblowers remains extremely dangerous, which is why we have also chosen to honour Patricia Mashale, whose disclosures about the South African police service have forced her to go into hiding.”
Since the inaugural Blueprint for Free Speech Whistleblowing Awards in 2016, former winners include: US soldier Chelsea Manning, for blowing the whistle on US abuses and suspected war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan; Dr Raj Mattu, for bravery in revealing patient safety and death concerns in the UK; John Kiriakou, a former CIA intelligence officer who revealed information on the torture of prisoners, in particular waterboarding; Dr Nick Martin, medical worker on Nauru off-shore immigration detention facility for blowing the whistle about patient conditions of children held in detention; Sally Masterton, former Lloyds Banking Group employee, awarded for revealing a failure to act on evidence of fraud and for her contribution to see justice for a crime that could involve more than a billion pounds; and Daniel Hale for blowing the whistle on the US drone programme.
Blueprint for Free Speech is an internationally recognized non-profit charity that provides research and analysis in support of freedom of expression for all people, as described in the UN Declaration of Human Rights. Blueprint undertakes research that aims to encourage more informed decision-making and public debate in this area. Blueprint seeks to remove barriers that may hamper freedom of expression, including seeking to reduce corruption and serious wrongdoing. A special focus is on protecting the journalist-and-source relationship to ensure a free and open media can act as an anti-corruption force in society.