Former police minister Nathi Nhleko has insisted that the justification for the irregular spending of public funds on a swimming pool at former president Jacob Zuma's Nkandla homestead as a security feature stands, despite African National Congress (ANC) secretary-general Fikile Mbalula admitting to it being a lie. 

In a voicenote circulated on Tuesday, Nhleko said his 2014 claim that the R4-million pool was a "fire pool" aimed at securing the home of the then president was backed up by facts. 

This despite Mbalula telling supporters in Mpumalanga on Sunday that Nhleko had lied to Parliament in defence of Zuma. 

"If I was lying about this [fire pool], he would have to mention who from the then leadership of the ANC - including the then deputy president, who is currently the president [Cyril Ramaphosa] whom I was reporting to regularly on these issues in the context of the political committee, for example - gave me an instruction to lie on behalf of the ANC," Nhleko said in the circulated voicenote. 

"If he can't issue the name of that person, then he is in trouble. Where does he get what he is talking about? You will discover there is no such person," he said. 

In the 2014 report titled Secure in Comfort, former Public Protector Thuli Madonsela found that Zuma had unduly benefitted from state-funded upgrades to his private home. 

But Nhleko, who was police minister at the time, insisted that the swimming pool, amphitheatre and kraal, among other features, were all constructed for the sake of securing Zuma. 

Mbalula told ANC die-hards that the party had defended Zuma despite a 2016 damning judgment by the Constitutional Court against him.

"We went to Parliament and opened an ad hoc committee and said a swimming pool is a fire pool. The [then] police minister [Nathi Nhleko] was sweating, seeing that this was a lie, because it is difficult to explain lies. People have lost their careers because of that thing," he said.

In response, Nhleko said his investigative report on Nkandla was backed up by scientific work, including experts in the fields of engineering, security, culture, and construction. 

"If he says I was lying, you need to counter me with something that says, 'here is proof that whatever you said was not true'. Up until this point, nobody can do that because nobody has the facts at hand," he said in the five-minute-long recording.

Zuma's efforts to campaign against the ANC and in support of the newly-formed MK Party have overshadowed the ruling party's political campaigning.

In the leaked recording, Nhleko appears to be responding to a person whom he only refers to as "Mgenge", and others he referred to as "comrades", whom sources identified as the leaders of the ANC in the Musa Dladla region of KwaZulu-Natal.

Seemingly referring to how the ANC handles matters, Nhleko said there was no "mature approach" in dealing with issues.

In the voicenote, he appears to refer to the current state of affairs in the ANC's political leadership, and talks about a "situation" that cannot be wished away, "no matter how much muti you have, never!".

Alternating between English and isiZulu, Nhleko lambasted Mbalula.

"I'm convinced now, and I don't like to talk about these things... but all I can say is in the ANC, if we still have a secretary-general like this one, the worst of its kind ever in the 112-year-old liberation movement, we're never going anywhere because you can't speak before you think. It just can't happen that way. In fact, it's a typical behaviour of a beetle moving cow dung around the kraal," he said.

Mbalula said he would not comment on the matter.