{"id":29351,"date":"2016-10-12T02:54:34","date_gmt":"2016-10-12T02:54:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/south-africa-s-finance-minister-issued-with\/"},"modified":"2016-10-12T02:54:27","modified_gmt":"2016-10-12T02:54:27","slug":"south-africa-s-finance-minister-issued-with","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/south-africa-s-finance-minister-issued-with\/","title":{"rendered":"South Africa’s finance minister issued with summons"},"content":{"rendered":"

{South Africa’s Finance Minister, Pravin Gordhan, has received a summons to appear in court on charges of fraud.}<\/p>\n

It relates to allegations of misconduct when he was in charge of the country’s tax collection service a decade ago.<\/p>\n

Mr Gordhan has said the allegations are wholly unfounded and are politically motivated.
\nThe summons requires him to appear in court on 2 November, which is after his budget policy statement due later this month.<\/p>\n

The fraud charges relate to alleged severance payments made to two senior executives at the South African Revenue Service (SARS), when it was under Mr Gordhan’s leadership 10 years ago.<\/p>\n

Prosecutor Shaun Abrahams also told a news conference that Mr Gordhan was being investigated for his role in setting up a surveillance unit at the tax department around the same time.<\/p>\n

Mr Gordhan has previously described that allegation as political mischief and has accused the special police unit conducting the investigation, known as the Hawks, of trying to intimidate him.<\/p>\n

Mr Abrahams denied there had been any political interference in the matter.<\/p>\n

In a statement released later by his lawyers, Mr Gordhan said he was taking legal advice “to bring the matter to an expedited end”.<\/p>\n

South Africa’s finance ministry once had a reputation for being immune from corruption, and the political shenanigans in the governing African National Congress (ANC).<\/p>\n

But that changed last year when South Africa had three finance ministers in a week.<\/p>\n

Analysts saw President Jacob’s Zuma attempt to install David van Rooyen – a political lightweight – as finance minister in December as a power grab by an elite perceived to be corrupt. They were defeated, with Mr Zuma forced to appoint Pravin Gordhan.<\/p>\n

The new minister warned of South Africa turning into a kleptocracy, and pointedly distanced himself from Mr Zuma’s business allies.<\/p>\n

But now Mr Gordhan faces a charge of fraud – and the courts will decide whether he was masquerading as a champion of good governance or, as he claims, is the victim of political mischief.<\/p>\n

He will probably become the first government minister in South Africa to be tried while in office – unless Mr Zuma fires him before then.<\/p>\n

Either way, it sets the scene for more political and financial turmoil in a country which was a beacon of hope for all of Africa when Nelson Mandela became its first black president in 1994, ending white-minority rule.<\/p>\n

{{Markets rattled}}<\/p>\n

Mr Gordhan’s efforts to rein in government spending have won him respect in the financial markets.<\/p>\n

News of his summons rattled the markets and the South African rand fell more than 3%.<\/p>\n

When President Zuma sacked Nhlanhla Nene as finance minister in December replacing him with David van Rooyen, the widely-criticised move sent the rand to record lows and caused the stock market to tumble.<\/p>\n

Within a few days Mr Gordhan was appointed in Mr van Rooyen’s place – a move designed to quell market discontent and restore some confidence.<\/p>\n

Many analysts believe that President Jacob Zuma would like to replace Mr Gordhan, who had previously served as South Africa’s finance minister from 2009 until 2014.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

{South Africa’s Finance Minister, Pravin Gordhan, has received a summons to appear in court on charges of fraud.} It relates to allegations of misconduct when he was in charge of the country’s tax collection service a decade ago. Mr Gordhan has said the allegations are wholly unfounded and are politically motivated. The summons requires him […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[100],"byline":[249],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-29351","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-justice","tag-africa","byline-bbc"],"bylines":[{"id":249,"name":"BBC","slug":"bbc","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":104}],"contributors":[{"id":249,"name":"BBC","slug":"bbc","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":104}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29351","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29351"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29351\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29351"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29351"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29351"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=29351"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=29351"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}