/ MEDIA STATEMENT / The content on this page is not written by Polity.org.za, but is supplied by third parties. This content does not constitute news reporting by Polity.org.za.

Failure of the Government to extradite persons implicated in corruption, as demonstrated by the recent case in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the consequences thereof.

Leonardo da Vinci famously said: “I have been impressed with the urgency of doing. Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Being willing is not enough; we must do.“

Four days after we were told, in April, that South Africa’s application for the extradition from the UAE of the Gupta brothers had failed, I submitted a request to the Speaker in terms of Rule 130 of the National Assembly Rules for a debate on an urgent matter of public importance.

Two months later, here we finally are to discuss the urgent matter.

While we waited, the subject was sliced, diced, chopped, analysed and spun by just about everyone with an opinion – besides us.

We, who were elected to hold government to account, have twiddled our thumbs long enough to give government time to ponder its losses and announce a new strategy – that could be just more spin.

Leonardo would have been impressed at the urgency of the Speaker’s response to my request for this debate. But what’s the point in declaring an urgent matter without treating it as urgent? 

“Urgency” is about determination to get something done. It’s about something requiring immediate attention… speedy action, and acting with insistent necessity. 

Urgency is also about a state of mind that enables us to identify our priorities, and ensure that we address them meticulously and effectively.

I couldn’t find a single word with the opposite meaning to “urgency”. The thesaurus suggested languid, lazy and sluggish, among other possibilities.

“Lack of urgency” arguably best describes the State’s overall legal response to the entire Gupta brothers saga.

On the UAE’s version of events, our extradition application lacked the determination to get something done. It lacked the meticulous attention to detail that acting with insistent necessity demanded. It lacked urgency.

The application lacked the necessary urgency to succeed, just as parliament lacked the urgency to schedule this urgent debate, urgently.

Lack of urgency has regrettably become a defining characteristic of this government. 

We know that extradition applications are fraught with difficulties. Applicant countries must often go to extraordinary lengths to convince holding country to extradite citizens or residents to face trial.

It’s a high stakes endeavour that demanded the very best from our Prosecuting Authority and members of the executive.

The Minister’s remark that the extradition was denied on a “technicality” seems to confirm the UAE’s version that South Africa did not meet the legal requirements of the extradition agreement between the two countries.

We did not submit a “live” warrant of arrest in support of our application.  The application was considered with a cancelled warrant of arrest and this is why the extradition application was denied.

 A failure of meticulousness, betraying a deeper lack of urgency.

It could be regarded as a “technicality”; alternatively, an unnecessary and careless error. The types of error that should be inconceivable in such a high stake cases.

Chief Justice Raymond Zondo handed the last parts of his State Capture report to the President a year ago.

The report unravelled a web of questionable companies and individuals, in the State and without, including members of the executive and the former state president, who allegedly colluded in the theft of Billions of Rands worth of taxpayers’ money.

The Gupta brothers, rightly or wrongly, became the poster boys of alleged state capture. For South Africans to believe in the integrity of the Billion Rand investment in the Zondo Commission is inextricably linked to their prosecutions.

So there was a lot riding on the matter, the Billion Rands and the nation’s belief and self-esteem. 

That’s why we asked for this urgent debate on a matter of national public importance.

We’ve listened to thousands of words from the Minister of Justice and his department seeking to assure South Africa that they did their best, and seeking to diplomatically place the blame for the failure of their extradition application on the UAE.

Besides details of the State to State engagement, or non-engagement, behind the scenes, we know very little.

Given the failure, in which South Africa was an applicant in a UAE court, we have questions about whether we consulted the right people in the UAE, with the necessary expertise and knowledge of the UAE system of justice.

If ours was purely a technical mistake, surely this would have been picked up and addressed had we been taking advice from people of high competence.

Nor can we avoid questions relating to our own competence. For the past five years we’ve been regularly assured that the criminal justice system, especially the National Prosecuting Authority, was being increasingly resourced so that it could prosecute those who have stolen from us.

The arrest of the Gupta brothers, on the back of our Interpol Red Notice, was a very significant step to demonstrating this growth. It reflected a National Prosecuting Authority that no longer followed the instructions of political masters, like sheep.

But looks can be deceptive. The failure to extradite the Guptas was a devastating blow to all patriotic and law-abiding South Africans.

The fact that they slipped through the NPA’s fingers, free as birds to holiday in Switzerland and take citizenship of Vanuata, rubs salt in the wound.

If this is a result of sloppy legal work then heads should roll. 

We know that the Minister met with his UAE counterpart last week, and that they established a joint task team, which will commence work next week on a fresh extradition process.

Make no mistake: The Gupta’s will take the best legal advice, and if they’re advised that the new agreement is threatening they’ll already be taking steps to reduce their exposure in the UAE.

South Africa is buckling under multiple disorders, from the rising costs of living to poverty and food insecurity, and from broken electricity supply to failing passenger and freight rail transport.

We need to hear from the Minister how those who created this undeserved suffering, for their own personal greed, will be held accountable.

This debate was proposed on the back of the failed extradition application of the Gupta brothers. But its national importance is about much more than this particular extradition and prosecution.

It’s more about the correction and stabilisation of our country’s critical institutions… about taking back our democratic and constitutional order from hijackers.

The response I would like to hear from the Minister goes beyond calm reassurances to about actual progress. 

It’s bigger than the Guptas.

We can’t foresee whether they’ll ever face prosecution here, but there are many prosecutions we should see that do not require extradition and which would begin to satisfy our need to see some consequences for looting and derailment of our developmental state.

With respect to extraditions, we now know the status of the Guptas, the struggles with the Bushiri’s and the curious matter of the Besters. But there’s another decision relating to the extradition of a corruption fugitive, Michael Lomas, that could open a whole new can of worms.

Lomas is implicated in a R745 million fraud and corruption case at the heart of the Kusile Power Station failures and the destruction of ESKOM’s planned power supply. 

Will we get him extradited to come and stand trial or will we be denied this because our prisons are regarded as too dangerous or unfit by the UK Home Secretary?  Will that be the next “technical” setback?

Issued by GOOD Secretary-General & Member of Parliament, Brett Herron