Other Names: None
Location: In the Johannesburg suburb of Kempton Park
Subordinate to: South African Defence Force (SADF)
Size: Unknown
Primary Function: Organochem was a procurement front company that acquired embargoed chemicals overseas, above all for the principal CW production facility Delta G Scientific

Description:
Organochem was an SADF procurement front company that Delta G made use of to buy all sorts of restricted chemicals from overseas suppliers. Among these were start-up chemicals employed in "Project Baxil," Delta G's top secret program for producing MDMA (better known as "Ecstasy"), an illegal drug that was ostensibly to be used as an incapacitant to control crowds. Organochem's managing director was Jerry Brandt, who later testified that Project Officer Wouter Basson had asked him to obtain the formula for manufacturing MDMA, along with various substances needed to produce the drug. The cover story Brandt used was that these particular substances were needed to make an insecticide, and in this way he managed to acquire both the formula and the precursor chemicals from Britain. In 1994, when he was not promptly paid 350,000 rand for his services by Basson, he repeatedly complained to Army Surgeon-General Niel Knobel, which eventually prompted Basson to pay him. Organochem was also allegedly involved in a 1992 scheme to purchase methaqualone in Croatia, since Delta G was also manufacturing that illegal drug for use as a possible incapacitant ("Project Mosrefcat").

Also noteworthy is that in 1989 Brandt was arrested in the United States for possessing secret documents. He and his accomplice Grant Wentzel—the very same individual who was later employed in the South African Narcotic Bureau's 1997 drug "sting" operation to snare Basson—were then accused of trying to export high-tech equipment to the Soviet Union. Only the intervention and mediation of the South African government led to their release, presumably because they were secretly operating as the agents of that government.

Key Sources:
Centre for Conflict Resolution, Basson Trial: Weekly Summaries of Court Proceedings, October 1999-April 2002, especially the testimony of Brandt and Koekemoer; Peter Hounam and Steve McQuillan, The Mini-Nuke Conspiracy: Mandela's Nuclear Nightmare (London: Faber and Faber, 1993), pp. 160-1; Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa, Hearings, June-July 1998, especially the testimony of Knobel.

	Updated March 2004