Row over Land Bank suspects

2009-07-13 19:04

Cape Town - A row broke out between the Democratic Alliance and the finance ministry on Monday after the opposition party accused deputy finance minister Nhlanhla Nene of refusing to name Land Bank fraud suspects to spare the ANC embarrassment.

The ministry countered that when Nene and new Land Bank boss Phakamini Hadebe came under fire in a portfolio committee meeting in Parliament late last week, he declined to divulge names purely because the suspects still had to be charged.

Since then, a news report has said that one of the suspects is a former Gauteng politician.

"They were not named because the matter is with the relevant law enforcement authority," finance ministry spokesperson Thoraya Pandy told Sapa.

She said Nene left to attend another meeting after some two hours of political questioning about multiple probes into fraud and corruption at the bank and delays in bringing the guilty to book.

'Political protection'

He asked the chairperson to grant Hadebe "political protection" in his absence, saying the new chief executive credited with turning around the troubled institution could only speak on operational matters.

The DA's Dion George however accused Nene of a cover-up.

He said the deputy minister had asked that Hadebe be spared a political grilling in order to avoid having to disclose the identities of alleged corrupt senior politicians.

"There is no reason for this to be necessary, save to spare corrupt officials from public scrutiny. If the investigations should then show that some of the suspected politicians are not guilty, their names would be cleared as a matter of course.

"But the only inference that can be drawn is that the ANC is aware of the fact that senior members of their party are severely implicated."

Unfortunate choice of words

Pandy said "political protection" may have been an unfortunate choice of words but George was confusing the issue as the deputy minister had already given a legitimate reason for not naming the suspects.

Hadebe and Nene briefed MPs on the progress of the criminal investigation into the misappropriation of some R2bn at the Land Bank, which finances emerging farmers.

Auditors blew the whistle on widespread wrongdoing at the bank two years ago, but so far nobody has been charged. The finance ministry has given the bank R3.5bn in credit guarantees.

There are four forensic investigations into irregularities at the bank - including the alleged transfer of millions of rands from the bank to black economic empowerment companies.

These have dragged on, partly because of the demise of the Scorpions and the transfer of two investigations to the new elite anti-corruption unit, the Hawks.

The Sunday Independent reported that the Hawks were poised to arrest a former senior Land Bank executive and a former Gauteng politician this week, but the unit refused to comment.
 

- SAPA