Not on my watch – Gigaba
EMBATTLED Home Affairs Minister Malusi Gigaba distanced himself from business dealings between the Gupta family and state-owned enterprises during the four years he held down the public enterprises portfolio.
Gigaba told the parliamentary inquiry into Eskom that contracts the power utility entered into with Tegeta, Trillian and Regiments did not happen on his watch, therefore “I cannot comment on them”.
During a heated exchange with DA MP Natasha Mazzone, Gigaba rejected suggestions he should have intervened to set aside contracts with the family’s business empire as allegations of impropriety grew. He insisted ministers should not involve themselves in procurement.
“But I was not involved in who gets what, I was a minister and ministers must remain out of procurement in state-owned companies, as well as in their own departments,” Gigaba said after Mazzone charged that he allowed state capture to happen “under your nose”.
In his testimony, which stretched for seven hours, Gigaba repeatedly expressed concern about the Gupta family’s influence over parastatals and political processes in the Zuma administration. He said it undeniably damaged the economy.
“I think the facts that are emerging before us would indicate that there was a lot of communication and background dealings that were taking place,” he said when MPs raised reports that Salim Essa, a close associate of the Guptas, sent Collin Matjila’s CV to the family shortly before he was appointed acting chief executive at Eskom in 2014.
Pressed about unsound decisions, he said it was never brought to his attention that there was “a push for certain Gupta-related companies”, but added that people who may have taken advantage of the situation when his attention was turned towards election campaigning.
He firmly rejected a suggestion from African Christian Democratic Party MP Steve Swart that Zola Tsosti was made chairperson of Eskom because he was a puppet of the Gupta family.
He also dismissed that these attempts to dictate to him as manipulation.
Swart then moved along to Tsotsi’s claim that former SAA chairperson Dudu Myeni informed him, in the presence of then president Jacob Zuma, in 2015, that a number of Eskom executives would be suspended. He said the incidents created the impression that the Gupta family, “via the family and via you”, held considerable sway.
Committee chairperson Zukiswa Rantho said Myeni still maintained that her health did not allow her to travel to Cape Town.
The Gupta brothers also shrugged off a request to testify yesterday, possibly the last day of the inquiry.
MPs grilled Gigaba about his ties with the family and whether they received preferential treatment from him when he served as home affairs minister for the first time.
He vehemently denied the suggestion, pointing to the fact that Ajay Gupta was not granted citizenship because he refused to relinquish his Indian nationality.
He pointed out that nine members of the family were naturalised between 2002 and 2006, before he became an MP.
He said four more were naturalised in 2015, and the department had been careful to respect the letter of the law.