ANC's 'Gupta defence squad'
These are three of the senior ruling party members who allegedly tried to bully banks into retaining Gupta family business, the Commission of Inquiry into State Capture heard yesterday.
Sinton tells how ANC officers fought for Gupta accounts not to be terminated.
Four senior ANC members, including two of the party’s current top six, have been implicated in an alleged attempt by the party to sway banks into resuming their business relationships with the Guptas, despite the family being suspected of flouting banking laws.
In what may lead to the four being called to appear before the Commission of Inquiry into State Capture, ANC chairperson Gwede Mantashe, deputy secretary-general Jessie Duarte, and head of the party’s national executive committee economic sub-committee Enoch Godongwana, were yesterday implicated in having attempted to influence Standard Bank to reverse its decision to close bank accounts two years ago.
Gupta companies, whose banking accounts were closed by the bank on June 6, 2016 – after being served with two months’ notice – included Oakbay Investments, Infinity Network, Estina Farm and The New Age.
The inquiry, which yesterday began hearing evidence from witnesses on the Gupta business accounts, has already served former mineral resources minister Mosebenzi Zwane and Labour Minister Mildred Oliphant with notice to appear before it for their role in attempting to persuade Standard Bank to reopen the Gupta accounts.
Testifying before the commission, retired Standard Bank general counsel Ian Sinton told of how the ANC and some Cabinet ministers – known as staunch supporters of former president Jacob Zuma – pressured the bank’s top management, including chief executive Sim Tshabalala, to reverse the decision to close the accounts, despite legal and business implications their reopening would have had for the bank here and abroad.
At a Luthuli House meeting which angered Tshabalala, ANC leaders allegedly told the Standard Bank team that they were “part of the white monopoly capital whose conspiracy is to oppress black businesses”.
Without explanation, the ANC leaders also accused the bank’s executives of “taking instructions from the ‘Stellenbosch group’”.
Although Oakbay Investments chief executive Nazeem Howa – in a separate meeting – accepted the bank’s closure of the accounts, he warned that about 7 500 employees faced losing their jobs. Sinton told the commission that failure by Standard Bank to be compliant with international banking norms would have rendered the financial institution as “risky to deal with”, and would have led to foreign banks cutting business ties with it.
He cited the Banks Act and the Financial Intelligence Act as being among laws that legally guided how banks operated to counter money laundering, dealing with suspicious transactions and organised crime. He said he interpreted the South African legislation to mean “wilful blindness to crime as bad as the commission of the crime itself”.
Legislation, said Sinton, ensured that the banking system was not used to aid corrupt practices and that it was compulsory for banks to disclose suspicious transactions to the Financial Intelligence Centre.
To Sinton and the management team, being invited by Mantashe to Luthuli House in 2016 was an appointment which could not be simply disregarded.
“We have a policy which we apply in dealing constructively with all stakeholders,” said Sinton.
“So, when ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe requested our chief executive Sim Tshabalala for a meeting at Luthulu House, we had to talk to them.”
The hearings into Gupta accounts continue this week, with an Absa representative Yasmin Masithela, retired FirstRand CEO Johan Burger and Nedbank CEO Mike Brown scheduled to testify.
Conspiracy to oppress black business