sacred sites in ism through the holiday, muslims share the joy and express the hopes of the future. on their normal albion, we congratulate the arab and islamic nations on the occasion of eda fitter and almighty willing, the coming years will be better and we will see it soon. you'd capella more, the message of it is about sharon love and all participants in that are encouraged to be peaceful citizens. they are told that the identity of islam is not just about clothes or style, but it's about someone's role and character. put us in your body cupboard galleria, this is a matter of great honor and dignity for all us. and for all muslims will, should try to please the almighty so that he forgives us in this month. which shall happen as by help in the week and the poor, so that the almighty will be pleased with us for good while are out of this new thou as it was, it's a could join us next. the whistleblowers will be back at the top of out ah,

what we've got to do is identify the threats that we have. it's crazy confrontation, let it be an arms race is on offensive, very dramatic development. only personally, i'm going to resist. i don't see how that strategy will be successful, very difficult time. time to sit down and talk ah. 2 2 there's a dichotomy around whistle blowing in south africa. on the one hand, there is an unusually large number of both public sector and private sector whistleblowers who have reported on waste, fraud, abuse, and illegality in the country. the culture is such that whistleblowers feel compelled to go public with their concerns and with reports of wrong doing. on the other hand, the united nation says that south africa is among the most corrupt countries in the

world. and every time we hear about a south african whistleblower, we inevitably here next about the nightmares that those whistleblowers have had to survive. i'm john kerry. aku welcome to the whistleblowers. ah. many of us came of age in a business or a government culture where we were taught to follow orders. if we see irregularities, many of us go through the chain of command believing. we've then done our jobs, but some people, the whistleblowers will not countenance waste fraud. abuse or illegality. our next guest is one of those people. cynthia simple was a treasurer at south african airways. she became aware of an irregular deal of 256000000 rand at south african. our ways under the leadership of do, do me any. cynthia reported the irregularity, but the deal went ahead anyway against her strict orders. in the end,

she saved millions of ran from being lost in this illegal and unethical deal, but the price that she paid was high. she lost her job, her reputation was damaged and she had to go to court and before a government commission to testify against former supervisors and colleagues. but none of that deterred her. not only did she take the fight to do, do me any, but she defended herself and then went on to defend nearly 100 other south african whistleblowers. cynthia simple. thank you so much for joining us. thank you very much, john for having me on your show. let's start at the beginning. you were working in a position of importance at south african airways. you were one of the company's group treasurers, a position to which you rose after decades in business. how long were you with the company when you began to see irregularities that you believed constituted a crime? and what did you do once you became aware of the problem? thank you john. yes, i was with isa ab, about 10 years. so i started,

they in 2006 as they hit a financial risk management. and i did work in the treasury department, and i deputized for the treasurer is who then worked. i was always like the to add weekly to i sealed the 2nd in charge when he was away. so would deputized the treasurer. it was only as late as 2015 that i finally got the position as group treasurer of being employed and appointed in it as a full mouth group, tracy ref. how did i come to see the the regular deal was fact my responsibility all as the good treasurer at that time was to source funding for issa a. and basically we had to ensure that an essay was kept liquid. so we looked at our cash flow months ahead. and with that we gave proposals to our board how we

should fund the organization. and it was already in 2015 that our board was interfering in the process of funding. they wanted to supply, they own funders. whereas normally any organization would seek funding through banks and not through an outside party and yard bank. our board went to to change the process which 1st raised the warning bouts for me. the 2nd part was when we had to am gone through the process of our requests for proposals and came up with some funding and suppliers. and the new people that we did not know could say that they were able to fund is a for 15000000000. and as the,

the banks could only do 4500000000 at that time, the banks are credited rated. they go through a stringent process and credit profile process. where is these clients that came on board? we didn't know them. so we obviously didn't recommended. and our board then made a decision to go with one of these clients that did not even go through the request for proposal funding. so that was my 2nd alarm bell and i and i was asked to rectify this decision and i refused. i said, i'm not going to do it. we either retract the are if p process and we start all over again. the board obviously wouldn't retract. and we then asked the rest of our risk management team. what would be the best way and the outcome of this? and they also recommended that we a retract everything and start all over again and put out a new r p or

b. we only send the ari pete to the client that the board recommended and hold back the decision until we receive that or if p and then make the decision on a consolidated level. that was agreed. the process went through this client. you'd actually also said they could find us better, could not pass the due diligence. so obviously, we couldn't or go with this kind to, we made recommendations again to the cfo. we not taking this deal. we need to go back, withdraw everything, and start a complete new r p process. and obviously that was all the warning bells that led up to my final disclosure with that board actually bypassed the treasury unit where i was working and, and the business unit head. and they went via procurement to rather seek a transaction advisor. so the transaction advisor was sought to under smooth

basis as in the funding perspective. and in the fee, it was $2680000.00. and there they only had to review our loan book, which we do normally as a treasury, as part of our day to day duties. and to review the lease agreement, which is dan balise department. and then to re look at the structuring of our balance sheet, which has been done by our finance department together with internal and external auditors. however, this was approved for client b and b, capital one, the transaction. and by them winning the transaction, they were supposed to just redo the reviews, which did not happen. what transpired, though, was that a see if o's then cool, we called the meeting and to finalize some issues and say the,

we have some outstanding matches, we haven't finalized on the funding. and that is when i hear for the 1st time you said board once to approve and changed the scope of being p capital, who initially was mandated only to do a review of our existing activities. and here the scope is to be changed to actually source funding and the fee, the fee was going to be 1.5 percent of $15000000000.00 rent making it including that which is that we add a tax $256000000.00 as a success fee, so we don't pay that to banks in resourcing funding. so i was also again called in and asked to sign a document to for board to approve this and i refused. so and that's

where i went further and, and then disclosed 2 executives within the organization and then took it to national treasure, which is a shareholder organization. at the time the board of directors was chaired by do, do me any, a politically powerful business woman with ties to then president jacob summa, a month earlier me any had actually told a meeting of senior company executives that it was, quote, our turn to eat, unquote. new were present in that meeting. it's shocking to me that a company executive would so boldly and publicly advocate corruption, but she meant it. what was your reaction at the time? indeed, john, i was shocked at something i didn't expect to be called into this meeting. and in this meeting, we were told we shouldn't bring our laptops and, or any of our cell phones, which were been taken at the door of the meeting by security,

which miss mckinney had brought into the organization. we sat down for the meeting, i was expecting that we would be instructed going forward. what we should do around the funding because we were in the critical situation. this was in february of 2016 and we had to earn, are you in coming up? we had to ensure that the company was going come soon and that we were well funded and that we had to also have meetings with our banks to tell them that this is our debt situation. we still had x amount of government guarantees and that we had national treasury behind us to secure that debt and as at least as collateral. and in this meeting, there was none of us being discussed. what was discussed

a was that we were prevented from attending the weekly meetings with national treasury, and we were told we should only attend on a monthly basis. and then that's when the chris, the sentence came out from a student mckinney that it's our turn to eat and it's our turn to manage and run the organization. so for me i, i think if there was a camera in the room, i probably would, might, you would have dropped in someone would have had to close it because i didn't expect that type of coming from her. we're speaking with south african financial was a blower. cynthia simple, we're going to continue our conversation after this short break. stay with us. ah

hi, i'm rick sanchez and i'm here to plead with you whatever you do, you do not watch my new show. certainly why watch something that so different. my little opinions that you won't get anywhere else, work of it please. if you have the state department, the c, i a weapons makers, multi $1000000.00 corporations. choose your facts for you. go ahead. i change and whatever you do. don't watch my show, stay mainstream, because i'm probably going to make you uncomfortable. my show is called direct impact, but again, you probably don't want to watch it because it might just changing the way. mm thing. ah .

ah welcome back to the whistle blowers i'm john carrie aka were speaking with south african whistleblower and activist, cynthia simple. cynthia, thanks for being with us. you objected very clearly to what was a very irregular deal with b and p capital. you said the fees were vastly inflated, and the b and p services being pushed were not even necessary. besides south african airways simply didn't have the money. you decided not to sign off on the deal, and then you left south africa for a short vacation abroad. but in your absence, me any and the board of directors approve the deal. it was then that you decided to formally blow the whistle. tell us about that. where did you go and what was the

response? so despite to my having spoken to the safe, oh, in telling her that we shouldn't be doing this transaction, and this was when they want to be changed. the scope of the be in p, i trans action from them just being mandated to do a review of our loan book and the nice book and the, the balance sheet and changed that to sourcing of funding. i was called on the 6th, the may and asked to sign a document stating that approval is given for b and p cap colds to change the original. so to so sing a fans, and then at this feed, the sex o exorbitant fee of $256000000.00, i refused, i refused there. and then, and i said, i'm not doing this. and i also said to the cfo, which is miss nancy,

that they'll be wiping out the savings and we really should not be doing this. she then said, oh, now that i'm putting it that way, she will review it. and i called for a meeting, i said, can we discuss this further and can i speak to the banks regarding this? she told me, wow, we can, we can have a meeting next week. and i said while i'm away, which was going to be, i'm just on a very short pilgrimage for, for a week. and she then asked who'd be deputize him for me? and i said, my deputy michael plain and i said, but please don't do anything until i'm back. she showed me no, they'll just be doing research. she said, give me the research what the banks would offer and she will be speaking to recline b, b capital. i lift it from her office and i directly went to my

deputies office, michael plain, and we had this discussion and i said to him, please do not sign anything in my absence please. this is what's going down at present that they want to change the scope of being p capital to become the source of funders and, and which is wrong. he vehemently said to me in his office, oh, this is wrong. how i won't sign anything. how can they expect this? that's what he told me. i fly out to paris and i'm doing a short part of the camino walk. it's called the with this one is walking from paris to shark tray. and, you know, i know the original camino route in france and by wednesday i come to small village and as you walk obviously these know each time

no white, i mean why fi it central connectivity? but when we got to the small coffee shop, we were taking a break. having our coffee, we take our phones and he, i see the see what's up message from my colleague. and he states, cynthia, i was forced to sign the still and to and i signed it and it's going to the buddage indication committee on friday. i looked at it and i was totally distraught. i thought he just told me the friday before, that he wasn't going to sign anything that it was going to wait for me before he made any decision. and now he's telling me that he was forced to sign it. so i immediately wrote back and i said to him that i am very disturbed by your decision . and because you told me you wouldn't sign and i instructed you not to sign anything. and then i said, be thinking, what do i do now? how?

who do i tell how do i stop this transaction? and our winter group leader, and i said to me, please excuse me, at least for half an hour because we were now ready to move on. and they were going to go into a nearby church. and i said to them, please excuse me, but the something i really need to do. and i set the quietly in the coffee shop while everybody went on to the church. and, oh, what's up with so blowing message, i don't know what else to do. and i gave the background of the deal i and the transaction, and the amount fact was going to be approved by the but did duty cation committee. and i even then asked for national treasury to, to intervene. so i sent that what have message to my peer little group more because we deal with the national treasury being our shareholder. if you are cfo you deal

at a higher level, and i doubt at the probably deputy director level and that's re i see my message to for asking them to please intervene. have a look at what's coming up and i sent this message. they after joined the rest of my group on their walk, but the rest of my pilgrimage was not as calming as i thought that he was going to be because i had this heavy heart of what would wait for me when i came back to the office i'd like to get into that in a little bit more detail. you went to the airlines executive manager, the chief risk officer and the head of internal audit, all logical people to whom to blow the whistle. but none of them did anything. you then went to people you trusted at the national treasury, and a week later, you submitted a complaint to south africa ombudsman. and finally, you made a disclosure to a civil rights group. but rather than being celebrated,

you were suspended for quote, unlawfully accessing and disclosing company documents on quote. it was only after a public outcry that the b and p deal was finally cancelled. the company still aggressively sought charges against you and you were placed under surveillance. in the end, you took an early retirement, but your whistle blowing led to a closer look at nationwide corruption. and you testified before the xander commission last year, you were completely vindicated. finally, what was that period like for you? it looked like you were, you were going to be ruined. it looked like you might even be in physical danger. how did you deal with that? john? i think he took the hardest time in, in my life, and i think similarly for every other whistleblower that all you doing is you chop you doing it to the best of your ability. you are pointing out what

is wrong. you pointing out the contravention of policies and governance areas. you are telling the right people that can make the decisions and everyone ignore with you. so i always say, i find it ironic that one, when one with blows the whistle. no one's truly listening because you are being gay . it's like someone is strangling you and no sound is coming out. and so it's horrific it. terrific. that no one re x to it. and i still cannot understand when people line executive senior executive positions and they just listen and do nothing. so it's either that they're protecting themselves or they just don't know what to do when that happens. so when this happened to me, john was that i and firstly that when i called in and suspended,

i didn't expect that i expected to have a discussion when i was called in for meeting a discussion about what's happening with been p a discussion with an open and ended on issues that we had on the table that was never finalized. like the if to see the free state development corporate deal, none of that was actually finally closed by the cfo. instead. she pushes across and late of suspension, just receiving that later floored me because i didn't know how to react. i had no expectation that this would happen to me. i, when i signed it, i didn't know what to write on it, but my signature i with hindsight i thought after that i should have written with essay paying for my legal fees or something like that. but those thought never came to my head. it was, i just signed it and i walked out with that later close to my chest because i was

afraid that any one could see it. that later felt like it was burning my finger tips. and i wanted to throw it away but knew i couldn't. i was struggling to breathe. i was struggling to hold back my tears. i will, i wished that time that i could fly out to the building or the the ground would open and i could just disappear in the basement area. but obviously, logically, i knew it wouldn't happen and that i had to keep my head up and i had to try not to cry, and i had to get out of the building as soon as i can. so what transpired, the after is the 1st day of realizing i can go to work. what do i do? and i've, i've worked all my life. the only time is when i'm on leave and my leave was always activity where i've been hiking all and taking care of my grandkids all and

doing something. so i'm now with an unplanned agenda. i don't know what to do. and i was so tempted to stay in my bed, the temptation as they, i was called up like ball. and i had to literally talk myself through. i dunno if you've seen that movie called kill bowl. where irma thurman has to speak to a big toe and tell the big to move and i felt the same i to tell myself, get absent, he get up, go to the shower and you know, get dressed, go to the gym that your normal routine and, and each dip had to talk through mentally, just to give myself the encouragement and the motivation not to stay in that bed. what happened to do? do me any, and others who were involved in the court, you in the corruption were they ever brought to justice?

john, it was our evidence that actually led to a case being made by outer the organization and during tax abuse to get her to her, drafted as a delinquent director. right. so what had transpired, we gave evidence at this under commission. and obviously our evidence was now in the public domain. it was myself, it was truly mon chill to work for. it's a who, a couple of months before i was suspended and i think she's, she was about 2 months prior to me. she was suspended. there was a mison, but dowell, who was also suspended. he was head of procurement. julie was head of a char, and so laden boss was the head of operations. so with as been defer suspended, she could put in various people, they who actually effected an further corruption which we were unable to stop.

and only found out at this under commission that those transactions actually went through and that money was spent. and, and that is a did lose that money. so and yes, and they, after we, and we gave evidence without turn, they end to another legal firm who said, who took the case to get miss miami? i declared as a delinquent director, and the case kept being postponed. i think 20192020 i think just 2021. that she was declared a delinquent director. she hasn't though, been charged criminally. and when i asked the question of one legal an organization, they said to me because she worked, they say it's sad african airways that must now criminally charged her. but some

african erases. never done that till she hasn't been charged criminally as yet. i'd like to thank our guests and be a sample for joining us and thank you. are viewers for being with us. i'd also like to leave you with some more words from president theodore roosevelt. he said, quote, in any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing. the next best thing is the wrong thing. and the worst thing that you can do is nothing. be like cynthia simple. do the right thing. we'll see you next time. 2 ah, during the 2nd in nazi occupied, poland, virginia was a farming region today. it's part of ukraine. between 943 and 945 members of the ukrainian insurgent army led by step on bendara. nasa could thousands of poles in

virginia in a diabolical ethnic cleansing process. the murders were particularly horrific and brutal villages were burned and property looted. the valinda massacre is without doubt one of the bloodiest episodes in polish ukrainian history. my al ukrainian politicians, still reluctant to talk about these events, how to modern day ukraine and poland view this tragedy of the past. and why does the memory of belinda still divide people ah, so real problem is the fact that nobody knows which is the easy. is it just an audience of countries? and there you have to lead this county side of a position before i being an easy position, or even a kind of friendly rich. we school to camtree's being glad to state in the united

states. ah ah headlines. listen, our fire robs at the airport of saddam's capital, where foreign nationals were supposed to be evacuated during 72 hours. cease fire causes grow in origin level. vast sums of money being sent to ukraine are right for pillaging us as the total us expenditure. he says last year is set to support for total funds given 5 gas call over to decade period time and dozens of minutes of the uganda faced while on charge of.