No indication from NPA on Gordhan

Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan

Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan

Published Aug 30, 2016

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Cape Town - The National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) has yet to give an indication on if or when it might charge Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan.

NPA spokesman, Luvuyo Mfaku, on Monday said the prosecutors were still studying the docket they received from the Hawks on Friday.

No decision, however, had been taken on the docket.

He said there was no prescribed period by when the NPA must formally charge the finance minister.

The NPA would not commit to a date for formal charges against any person, he said.

Gordhan and former senior officials of the South African Revenue Service (Sars), Johan van Loggerenberg and Ivan Pillay, face possible charges over a rogue unit.

The unit was set up at Sars when Gordhan was the commissioner there in 2007.

He spent 10 years at the agency until he was appointed to cabinet in 2009 by President Jacob Zuma.

He was removed from the Treasury after the 2014 national and provincial elections, but returned in December last year after the disastrous appointment of Des van Rooyen.

The appointment of Van Rooyen wiped off R500 billion from the South African economy.

The Public Investment Corporation, which is under the Treasury and has assets worth R1.4 trillion, lost almost R100bn during that period.

Gordhan has received backing from jurists, academics, some sections of the ANC and civil society in general.

They believe he is being persecuted for making a stand against corruption.

Gordhan last week called on the Hawks to let him do his job and insisted he has done no wrong.

He said he was under no obligation to hand himself over to the Hawks last week Thursday.

This was after talks between his lawyers and Hawks boss Lieutenant-General Berning Ntlemeza.

But the ANC Youth League, a vocal supporter of President Jacob Zuma, has called on him to subject himself to the law.

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