A report by the Pan-African Institute for Socialism (PAIS) has exposed the depths of of collusion between Western intelligence and South African media for propaganda purposes, pushing a consistent theme that Africa must defend Ukraine “given the risk of authoritarianism on our continent”.
The report reveals correspondence between head of Brenthurst Foundation, Greg Mills, who is also “Daily Maverick” editor-at-large, and the Ukraine Minister of Defence in which Mills is requesting an interview.
In the email, dated 5 April 5, 2023, Mills describes the propaganda work he has done for the Western regime for an African audience and goes on to describe how the Brenthurst Foundation, established by South African oligarchs, the Oppenheimer family, has published over 30 op-eds and five videos as pro-Nato propaganda.
Mills says he has visited Ukraine five times in the last year, including taking African opposition politicians from South Africa, Uganda and Tanzania.
Mills boasts of his reach into faith leaders on the continent, writing that he also took the Archbishop of Cape Town, Thabo Makgoba, to Ukraine during one of the five trips.
He requests for an interview with the minister by the end of April or early May, stating that he intends to publish several articles for the “Daily Maverick” and the Royal United Services Institute (Rusi), which describes itself as “the world’s oldest and the UK’s leading defence and security think tank”.
He writes: “The Brenthurst Foundation’s core role is to prepare growth and stabilisation strategies for governments, mainly in Africa, but also including others such as Colombia. I am currently on secondment as the strategic adviser to the president of Zambia.
“I intend to produce a video on this trip, and write several articles including for the “Daily Maverick” and Rusi (where I serve on the advisory board), which has published several of my Ukraine pieces. I am also completing a book with David Kilcullen, the former adviser to (former US Secretary of State) (Condoleezza) Rice and General David Petraeus as a sequel to our book on Afghanistan”.
PAIS reports that Mills is embedded in the US/UK military and intelligence complex, and that even the board of the Brenthurst Foundation includes Nick Carter, the former chief of the defence staff of the UK, Richard Myers, a former chairperson of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the US military, and Rory Stewart, a British diplomat with a murky background in British intelligence circles.
PAIS further reported that the “Daily Maverick” has been an ‘’uncritical cheerleader“ for Nato and US interests at almost any cost.
It referenced how the “Daily Maverick” recently came under fire for publishing an investigative piece into corruption at South African state-owned power utility Eskom that “contained no facts“.
PAIS said that other media houses declined to publish the story, which was based on false information “concocted by self-confessed apartheid era killer Tony Oosthuizen for George Fivaz Forensic and Risk. The dossier was commissioned by former Eskom CEO André de Ruyter, who solicited R18 million from Business Leadership South Africa. The total cost of the fake dossier was R50m.”
“At the time of writing, Daily Maverick’s page on the investigation is still live. There has been no retraction, correction, or apology from the ‘Daily Maverick’. Other publications did not mention Daily Maverick’s role in publishing false information.
“While other media houses did not publish the story that contained no verifiable facts, the ‘Daily Maverick’ served as stenographers simply because the dirty dossier claimed that Russia was ‘actively involved in sabotage and (the) destruction of Eskom’. ”
It further stated that “Daily Maverick” has housed propaganda pieces published by Mills and Ray Hartley, a frequent writing partner and another pro-Nato and US propagandist. The pieces are also housed on the Brenthurst Foundation’s site, all of which have a pro-US, pro-Nato, “and often times anti-ANC government bias”.
“In prioritising Nato and Western propaganda over fact checking, Brkic has disavowed his ethical duty not to publish unverified claims,” the PAIS report stated.
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