ANC's Godongwana to approach state capture commission after banks' testimony
19 September 2018
Chairperson of the ANC's subcommittee on economic transformation Enoch Godongwana says he will approach the commission of inquiry into state capture to give his side of the story about meetings the political party held with some of South Africa's big banks after they stopped doing business with Gupta-owned businesses.
"I just want to give my side to the commission," Godongwana told News24 on the sidelines of trade union federation Cosatu's 13th congress on Tuesday.
He, along with ANC national chairperson Gwede Mantashe, who was then secretary general, and deputy secretary general Jessie Duarte, met with Standard Bank and Absa while FNB declined an invitation.
In his testimony, Standard Bank's head of compliance Ian Sinton told the commission headed by Deputy Chief Justice Raymond Zondo about two meetings; one with senior ANC officials and another with an inter-ministerial committee.
Sinton claimed ANC leaders wanted to convince the bank to reverse its decision to stop doing business with the Guptas and on Tuesday former FirstRand group chief executive Johan Burger said he received a call from Godongwana to meet with the governing party.
The former FirstRand executive claimed the meeting was called off at the last hour following a list of questions he sent to the ANC. Burger said he wanted to know who would participate in the meeting and to get a scope of what was to be discussed.
"I don't want to refer to the evidence at this stage, including Sinton's," Godongwana told News24, confirming that he knew all four banks' testimonies mentioned his name.
The banks, including Nedbank which is yet to testify, stopped doing business with the Guptas following "suspicious transactions".
The family is accused of having undue influence over former president Jacob Zuma and members of his executive which it used to loot state-owned enterprises.
