By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
President Cyril Ramaphosa says government has been working hard to strengthen and support law enforcement and related agencies in a fight against corruption in public institutions, fight fraud and collusion in the private sector.
In his weekly letter to the nation, Ramaphosa said that the fight against corruption requires both firm political will and independent, capable crime-fighting institutions.
“In my first State of the Nation Address, in 2018, I made a commitment to turn the tide against corruption in our public institutions and fight fraud and collusion in the private sector with the same intensity and purpose.
“Since then, we have been working hard to strengthen and support our law enforcement and related agencies,” he said.
Through these agencies and support, he highlighted that
- The Investigating Directorate has enrolled over 20 corruption cases in the last financial year and 65 accused have been charged. These include several ‘state capture’ and other serious corruption cases.
- The Asset Forfeiture Unit obtained freezing orders to the value of R5.4 billion relating to corruption offences, with R70 million paid into the Criminal Assets Recovery Fund.
- The SIU has recovered funds and assets to the value of R2.6 billion and set aside contracts to the value of R18 billion. A total of 119 cases worth more than R13 billion have been enrolled by the SIU at the Special Tribunal.
“Corruption is an extremely complex crime to prosecute,” he said.
“Perpetrators go to extraordinary lengths to cover their tracks. They set up shelf companies to hide dodgy transactions, rapidly moving monies between multiple accounts, misrepresenting income to the tax authorities, and, in the case of government employees, using friends and relatives to apply for tenders to mask their involvement.
“This means that the response of the authorities has to be just as sophisticated.”
In addition to appointments to the new National Anti-Corruption Advisory Council, the president also announced that other agencies will shift their focus.
The ‘Fusion Centre’, set up as an operational hub to address priority financial crimes, including corruption during the Covid-19 pandemic, will expand to include money-laundering, fraud, maladministration, terrorist financing and other serious financial crimes.
This comes as the country faces being ‘greylisted’ and potentially excluded from financial systems due to its vulnerability for these types of crimes.
Ramaphosa also said that the government will lean further into the South African Revenue Service and its capacity to conduct lifestyle audits, adding that in the last year, SARS completed 25 lifestyle audits to the value of over R450 million to resolve discrepancies between declared income and an individual’s lifestyle.
“It is clear that the measures we have taken as this administration to restore the capacity, capability and credibility of the institutions involved in the fight against corruption are having a demonstrable impact,” he said.
“The synchronised work of all the law enforcement agencies is hitting criminals where it hurts most: in their pockets. Public funds that were looted and diverted are being recovered and those responsible for these acts are being prosecuted by our courts.”