On 24 January 1979, the Minister of Information, Connie Mulder, resigns his seat in Parliament at the insistence of the Prime Minister P. W. Botha as a result of his involvement in the Information Scandal.
"Muldergate", as the scandal was also named, involved Mulder, with the knowledge of then Prime Minister, B.J. Vorster, in a plot to sell apartheid propaganda with the use of state resources.
In 1973 Vorster had agreed to shift R64 million from the state in order to execute this plan.
Plans included bribes of international news agencies and the purchase of the Washington Star newspaper.
These funds were also used to establish an English newspaper, The Citizen, which was pro-apartheid government.
A commission of inquiry concluded that Vorster knew everything about the corruption and had tolerated it. He resigned from the presidency.