CAPE TOWN, January 30 (ANA) – Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan on Monday, denied the claim by the Gupta family’s Oakbay Investments that he had colluded with banks to harm the company, saying the banks acted because of the company’s ties with “politically exposed” figures.
Gordhan, in his replying affidavit to papers submitted by Oakbay earlier this month, said neither he, nor the Reserve Bank, influenced major banks — Absa, Standard Bank, First National Bank, FirstRand and Nedbank — to close the company’s accounts.
“Connections of bankers’ clients with politically exposed persons trigger banks’ national and international legal duties. It is because each of the banks has considered itself under a legal duty pursuant to the international and domestic statutory instruments applying to it that Oakbay’s accounts were closed.”
The affidavit was submitted on Monday, and is the latest submission in a legal battle that began last year when Gordhan asked the Pretoria High Court for a declaratory order that he had no right or duty to heed Oakbay’s requests to intervene on the company’s behalf after major banks closed its accounts.
Gordhan rubbished Oakbay’s arguments in its earlier answering papers to his founding affidavit, saying the company had effectively gone from imploring him to intervene in its relationships with banks in its favour to falsely accusing him of exceeding his powers by doing so to its detriment, and demanding that this be investigated.
Oakbay soon responded to Gordhan’s affidavit by accusing the minister of abusing his position to obtain information from the Financial Intelligence Centre (FIC) in a bid to sully its name.
“Today’s affidavit is a case of reverse victim syndrome. The applicant proactively came after us and smeared our name with a flawed list of transactions – that he used his unique executive power to obtain – and then questions the manner of our response to him,” a spokesperson said in a statement on Monday.
“Our bank accounts remain closed and no evidence exists to prove why that is the case. We look forward to clearing our name in Court.”
In his 103-page affidavit, Gordhan had said Oakbay’s attack on him further made no sense, in that had it been true that he was politically plotting against the company, it would never have approached him for help after the banks shut its accounts.
“Had Oakbay honestly considered that I had orchestrated a concerted campaign against it, Oakbay would of course not have approached me for assistance.”
Gordhan said Oakbay did not contest its political ties, nor did it dispute the Pretoria High Court’s jurisdiction to grant the relief for which he had asked.
He noted that Oakbay had confirmed on Friday that it saw “no contested legal issue here” and argued that it therefore could not oppose the order he has sought from the court.
The company’s answering papers had included a reference to the minister as “weak-kneed” and an argument that his application rested on “flawed” reasoning.
In his founding affidavit, Gordhan revealed that payments totalling R6.8 billion made by the Gupta family and companies they controlled, in 72 transactions, had been flagged as suspicious by finance authorities.
He asked the banks to provide confidential reports made to the FIC in open court so that Oakbay’s claim that they had acted improperly could be tested.
On Monday, Gordhan reiterated that Oakbay had asked him to approach the banks “in the national interest”.
He argued that he was serving the national interest by approaching the court in a bid to protect the integrity of the country’s finance and banking sectors and the economy at large. The minister said he asked for “the determination of a pure question of law” yet Oakbay had responded with “wide-ranging and extraneous” allegations of fact.
He went on to suggest that it was ironic that Oakbay had accused him of having a political motive when the owners of the company stood accused themselves of improperly meddling in government decisions.
“Yet it is Oakbay that, the Public Protector has found, influences political appointments.”
Since his return to the finance portfolio just more than a year ago, Gordhan has found himself in a position of objecting to numerous government contracts awarded to companies linked to the powerful family.
In the case of the Eskom coal contract given to Tegeta Exploration, it led to a highly public spat with former Eskom CEO Brian Molefe, who quit his post following former Public Protector Thuli Madonsela’s damning observations about the utility’s relationship with the family in her final “State of Capture” report.
Gordhan’s stated determination to prevent state resources flowing to patronage networks has been read as an act of opposition to President Jacob Zuma, who has refused to sign into law a bill giving wider powers to the FIC.
His position within government is therefore seen as tenuous as he prepares the second national budget of his new term, though fraud charges brought against him last year were soon withdrawn and he is widely credited with averting a further credit rating downgrade.
The minister dismissed the criminal charges, relating to the early retirement and subsequent re-employment of senior South African Revenue Service official Ivan Pillay, as “political mischief”.
It was reported on Sunday that Molefe may soon be sworn in as an MP to allow his ascension to a Cabinet post, potentially Gordhan’s.
– African News Agency (ANA)
