NATIONAL NEWS - Businessman Mzwanele Manyi is on Wednesday expected to return to the commission of inquiry into state capture chaired by Deputy Chief Justice Raymond Zondo to give testimony relating to The New Age (TNA).

Manyi is accused of favouring TNA and ANN7 and channelling millions from government advertising funds to the two companies formerly owned by the controversial Gupta family.

In 2017, Manyi’s media company took over the Guptas’ TNA and television station ANN7. The two media outlets are now defunct.

The commission is expected to also hear testimony from the former director-general of government communication and information system (GCIS), Themba Maseko, who was replaced by Manyi in 2011 after he was fired for refusing to do the bidding of the Guptas.

Manyi was implicated at the commission by the acting GCIS chief executive Phumla Williams who told Zondo that during the former’s tenure as head of GCIS, the procurement department was allegedly “bullied” into hosting TNA and SABC breakfasts even though these fell outside the GCIS’s scope, which is broadcast and print.

Williams gave testimony at the commission that Manyi allegedly made sweeping changes at GCIS regarding tender processes, insisting that the tender committee report to him.

However, Manyi slammed Williams’s evidence against him at the commission, saying he got rid of corruption which the latter was allegedly a part of.

Meanwhile, former president Jacob Zuma is expected to return to the witness stand at the commission on Monday, November 11 to November 15.

Read more on the Caxton publication, The Citizen