Ramaphosa says it cannot be that executive members, which include him, are the ones who take charge or decide about the matter because it will have serious implications for these agencies.

He was responding to a supplementary question put forward by the National Freedom Party’s (NFP) Shaik Emam, who asked why there hasn’t been action taken against those implicated in the State Capture and VBS scandals. The VBS saga has since landed four municipalities in the North West in hot water after it was found to have invested over R300 million of taxpayer’s money with the bank while the Free State Development Corporation (FDC) allegedly invested millions of rands with the bank. Ramaphosa says these law enforcement agencies are the ones that will execute their task without fear or favour.

Ramaphosa added that it is these law enforcement agencies that must make decisions of who needs to be prosecuted and that It cannot be the president, the deputy president, or the cabinet. It must be the prosecuting authority that will take that decision. “The day the president does so, it will basically mean that we have gone back once again. It will basically mean that we are combining the roles that the independent agencies and the executive authority have to play,” says Ramaphosa.

In July 2019, the Hawks’ conducted a search and seizure raid at the offices of the FDC in Bloemfontein in connection with the entity’s dealings with the now-defunct VBS Mutual Bank. The FDC came in the spotlight in 2018 following the release of Jerry Motau’s ‘Great Bank Heist’ report on the liquidated VBS. Motau alleged the FDC, along with 52 other entities and individuals, received “gratuitous payments” from the bank. The FDC vehemently denied that the more than R104 million was “gratuitous”, stressing that it was an investment instead.

OFM News