Muldergate
Most ambitiously, the fund was used to establish a new pro-government newspaper, the Citizen, and in attempts to purchase both the Rand Daily Mail and the Washington Star.
Rhoodie was prosecuted for fraud and theft, and one other participant, American media magnate John P. McGoff, also faced criminal charges related to the scandal.
The project was authorised by Vorster; by the Minister of Information, Connie Mulder; and by Hendrik van den Bergh of the Bureau for State Security (BOSS), which also helped with its funding.
"[5] Vorster later said that the purpose was "to assist in a delicate and unconventional way in combating the total onslaught against South Africa," and "to withstand the subversion of our country's good image and stability.
[11][6] Participants said it included: The Project had initially planned to arrange the sale of the Rand Daily Mail, the most staunchly anti-apartheid national newspaper of the era, to Louis Luyt, a conservative business tycoon who would steer the paper in a more sympathetic editorial direction.
When shareholders refused to sell to Luyt, the Project decided to establish an entirely new pro-government, but ostensibly independent, English-language newspaper.
[5][17] In 1974, the Project also attempted to facilitate the sale of the American Washington Star, with similar plans to sway its editorial policy toward a favourable view of the South African government.
[5] Luyt's counterpart in this unsuccessful bid was right-wing media magnate John P. McGoff, who was provided $11.3 million in Project funds with which to purchase the Star.
[5][18] McGoff went on to use part of the funds to purchase an interest in the Sacramento Union, and was ultimately investigated and charged by the American Department of Justice for acting as the agent of a foreign nation.
[19] [T]he Department of Information has, for years, been asked by the government to undertake sensitive and even highly secret operations as counteraction to the propaganda war being waged against South Africa.
In this regard, Mulder faced particular public censure – in May 1978, responding to a parliamentary question from opposition politician Japie Basson, he had denied outright that the Citizen had been financed with state funds, thereby lying to Parliament.
[5][11] At the end of January 1978, amid widely circulated rumours inflamed by media reports, Parliament's Committee on Public Accounts, chaired by Hennie van der Walt, initiated an inquiry.
[25] On 20 September, Vorster resigned as Prime Minister, citing ill health, and took up the State Presidency, a largely ceremonial position similar to that of Governor-General of South Africa.
Finance Minister Owen Horwood appointed Justice Anton Mostert to carry out an inquiry into foreign exchange control violations in particular.
Vorster continued to maintain that he had first learnt of the Citizen project in August 1977, during the state audit, and that it had been discussed in his Cabinet only once, shortly before his resignation as Prime Minister.
[11][12] In an interview with the BBC, he told David Dimbleby that he was a scapegoat and that senior officials, including the Prime Minister, had authorised the projects.
