Over the years we have been given the impression by the media the Jacob Zuma is the last person in the world who wants an arms probe to proceed, so it was quite surprising for most people to see that President Zuma announced a commission of enquiry into the arms deal corruption this past week.

Both German and Swedish companies have commissioned internal audits which have confirmed that bribes were paid to secure the South African contracts and one can only hope that a proper commission, with an independent chairperson, is set up so that once and for all this story which now goes back for 15 or 16 years can be properly investigated and resolved. The terms of reference will also be crucial, because the commission needs to be able to investigate everything, and not just a narrow set of issues that makes it impossible to get to the bottom of the entire story.