In mid-May 2017, Public Protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane, now suspended, emailed an investigator that she was awaiting State Security Agency input on the apartheid-era Absa Bankorp bailout report -- and a constitutional amendment on changing the Reserve Bank's mandate was subsequently included, Parliament's Section 194 impeachment inquiry heard.

Monday's witness, ex-Public Protector senior investigator Tebogo Kekana, publicly turned whistle-blower and, under oath, talked about the protected disclosure statement he had deposed in December 2019.

That affidavit had lifted the lid on how the 17 May 2017 email -- in which Public Protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane said she had "asked SSA (State Security Agency) to provide input and economist" to change the South African Reserve Bank's (SARB's) constitutional mandate -- had not been disclosed as part of the court review of the Absa Bankorp report.

"If it was part of the record, there would have been a media outcry. So it wasn't included," Kekana told MPs, adding that he had copied all of the investigation file and handed it over to the then senior legal manager.

As far back as August 2017, this Public Protector report --...