Could this derail case against Gordhan?

Published Oct 27, 2016

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Parliament - The case against Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan could be dealt a serious blow after it emerged on Wednesday that more than 3 000 public servants were granted early retirement before reaching 60 years of age over a five-year period.

This is the supplementary affidavit of the director of the Helen Suzman Foundation, Francis Antonie, in the Gauteng High Court, Pretoria.

Gordhan has been charged for approving the early retirement of former Sars deputy commissioner Ivan Pillay.

This is the charge that Gordhan faces in the Pretoria Regional Court next Wednesday.

Gordhan delivered his Medium Term Budget Policy Statement in Parliament on Wednesday.

The Helen Suzman Foundation and Freedom Under Law have challenged the charges against Gordhan, and want the court to throw them out. They argued that the charges were baseless.

Antonie said they had found new information following their court action.

He said the information they obtained from the Government Pensions Administration Agency has confirmed their contention that the case was baseless.

The agency has confirmed that more than 3 000 requests for early retirement were approved between 2005 and 2010. This was for people who were under the age of 60 years.

Antonie said the NPA had not sought this evidence before charging Gordhan early this month.

Gordhan himself has said in the past that this was an administrative issue.

Antonie said the NPA did not do its job before charging the finance minister. “The subpoena is an indictment of the investigative and prosecutorial process. It is also clear that the NPA does and had never completed sufficient investigations nor had sufficient evidence to take the formidable decision to prefer charges against Minister Gordhan,” he said in the papers.

This issue should have been looked at before charging Gordhan.

The matter is set down for the court hearing in November, where a decision will be made.

But Gordhan declined to answer questions on his case on Wednesday. He said he will be able to talk about it when he appears in court on November 2.

* There were mixed reactions to Gordhan’s policy statement on Wednesday, with some praising him for pulling off a tough balancing act, and others disagreeing with him but vowing to back him against “persecution”.

ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe welcomed the budget proposals, saying Gordhan did “relatively well under the circumstances”. Mantashe said he was impressed that government would sustain its spending on both higher and basic education.

DA leader Mmusi Maimane praised Gordhan’s speech, saying that it contained some DA proposals, including allocating a progressive increase to the higher education budget. He added his party would be lobbying for more interventions in this sector.

Maimane said the government had failed to adequately respond to the demands of students, but had rather responded with force.

Higher Education Minister Blade Nzimande criticised the protesting students, describing the violent scenes outside the legislature as “unfortunate” and “unpleasant”. The minister acknowledged that while adding R17 billion to fund tertiary education over the next three years was a welcome relief, it would not be enough to provide free education to all poor, academically deserving students. “It’s certainly not enough but its a huge step forward,” Nzimande said.

EFF leader Julius Malema was left disappointed by the fact that free higher education did not feature in the MTBPS. “The ANC must take full responsibility and continue to look for money, call a national dialogue where concrete proposals will be made on where money can be sourced so that we finance this free education. It is not going to go away, it is going to happen, year in, year out, until free education is delivered.

While pledging his support for Gordhan, Malema said: “We do not agree with his budget. We don’t agree that he did not declare free education. But his limitation is that he is serving a wrong organisation.”

Malema pledged his political support to Gordhan when he appears in the Pretoria Regional Court on November 2. “We came to say to the minister he is not alone. We can see political persecution. We know how those who abuse state institutions operate,” Malema said.

“Therefore the whole world must know that we don’t have any doubt that our minister did not do anything wrong.”

Malema slammed ANC MPs for giving Gordhan a standing ovation before he tabled the medium-term budget, branding them “pretentious”.

“At night they are going to be plotting against him. At night they are going to be identifying items in that budget they will be stealing from. But Zuma’s days are numbered,” Malema said.

The IFP heaped praised on Gordhan for staying on the path of fiscal consolidation, but cautioned that increased borrowing to fund government priorities did not bode well for the future.

“What is of grave concern to the IFP is South Africa’s increasing debt which currently stands at just over R2 trillion and currently generates a debt repayment of R147bn per year, and our worry is that should the country suffer another credit ratings downgrade, the interest payment will increase and that additional debt service fee will have to be found from the fiscus,” said IFP chief whip Narend Singh.

Organised labour was critical of the budget proposals. Cosatu said the budget was not pro-poor enough. Matthew Parks, Cosatu’s parliamentary deputy co-ordinator, said this year’s MTBPS was a “business budget”.

“We are quite disappointed. This is basically a business-as-usual budget. We could not see anything fundamentally different to stimulate the economy and to create jobs.Workers have had an economic crisis for 40 years.”

Political Bureau

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