Civil action group, the Organization Undoing Tax Abuse (Outa) has shown evidence that the financial group which was hired by SAA and paid R256 million\u00a0was not in a position to offer its services.<\/p>\n
The group made the revelations at a press conference on Friday (8 July).<\/p>\n
On Thursday, BDLive reported that state-owned airline, SAA, continued its dubious financial practices by awarding a R256 million award to a \u201cboutique financier\u201d without going through the appropriate tender processes.<\/p>\n
According to the report, the SAA board waived tender procedures for the contract\u00a0\u2013\u00a0against advice from its own treasury\u00a0\u2013\u00a0and ended up paying three times what it had to for services.<\/p>\n
The financier, BnP Capital, was initially appointed to advise SAA on the restructuring of its R15 billion debt.<\/p>\n
The company then advised that it be hired, urgently, to raise the financing itself, securing a 1.5% success fee in the process.<\/p>\n
Read:\u00a0Cash-strapped SAA shrugs off tenders in R256 million deal: report<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n According to Outa, after receiving a number of tip-offs about the illegality of the deal, it reached out to “various sources” through its whistle-blower platform and uncovered evidence that the deal was illegal can not move forward.<\/p>\n At the top of the list of dodgy elements in the deal, the group pointed out that BnP did not have a finance licence, which should have excluded it from consideration altogether.<\/p>\n “As part of criteria, they company should have had a Financial Services Board (FSB) license. This company had its license suspended,” it said.<\/p>\n Outa found out from the FSB\u00a0that\u00a0BnP Capital’s licence had been suspended\u00a0for “possible serious transgressions”. Despite this fact, the documentation in the deal had a check mark next to the licence.<\/p>\n Adding further questions to the company, Outa pointed out that the BnP had a history of white directors – and shortly before the SAA deal, a black director was appointed. Outa\u00a0also established BnP Capital is not trading from its registered address.<\/p>\n It also found that names had been crossed off of the approval documents, and other signatures had been added – and then put forward as having “full board approval”.<\/p>\n It called on more whistle blowers to come forward so that it could compile all the evidence to challenge the SAA – and other government institutions suspected of corrupt activities – in court.<\/p>\n “We will soon be exposing the road construction contracts,” said Outa lead, Wayne Duvenage. “We will do whatever we can to remove those involved in wrongdoing from office.”<\/p>\n Did SAA just admit to massive collusion?<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n Zuma\u2019s friend tightens grip on SAA: report<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n Gordhan to give SAA\u2019s Myeni the axe?<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\nMore on SAA<\/h3>\n