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Two dramatic twists yesterday preceded the long-awaited hearing of Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan’s case before the North Gauteng High Court today.
Gordhan wants a declaratory order that he cannot in any way interfere in the relationship between a bank and its clients – a response to the supposedly persistent lobbying he was subjected to by the Gupta family’s businesses when all major local banks refused to do business with them or their companies last year.
First, the Guptas’ Sahara Computers filed new papers yesterday asking that Gordhan be held personally liable for the legal costs of the proceedings.
The reasoning was that Gordhan’s application was actually a political ploy and waste of taxpayer money which, Sahara said, means he couldn’t use the State Attorney as legal representative.
This new strategy was evidently thought up by the controversial family’s new legal team appointed on March 16.
“It was brought to Sahara’s attention that given the pretence of the minister to litigate in his ex officio [official] capacity, but which litigation is actually for the personal political benefit of the minister, that the authority of the State Attorney to act was open to dispute,” read an affidavit by Sahara’s chief executive Stephanus Nel.
Included in the court papers was correspondence between the State Attorney and the new lawyers for Sahara, Stein Scop Attorneys.
Among these are letters from the State Attorney lashing out at the new strategy as being hopelessly late and, in any case, legally incompetent.
The State Attorney has “inherent statutory authority to represent an organ of state”, read a response to Sahara’s lawyers.
Nel excused bringing this new argument before the court at the eleventh hour, months after the case was lodged, by saying that Sahara’s “previous legal representatives did not bring the possibility of disputing [the State Attorney’s] authority to its attention”.
One day after the new team from Stein Scop Attorneys was appointed, they launched the new strategy.
The Gupta companies previously argued that Gordhan’s case was a political ploy to embarrass the family and formed part of a conspiracy to destroy their business empire.
Sahara now insists that Gordhan must produce evidence of the proper appointment of the State Attorney and wants this application heard this morning before the actual case gets heard.
The second twist was President Jacob Zuma joining the case, effectively on the other side from Gordhan.
He responded to Standard Bank, which filed a broader application than Gordhan to have the court declare that no part of the executive branch of government can intervene in banks’ relationship with clients.
This was a response to the bizarre behaviour of Mineral Resources Minister Mosebenzi Zwane, who last year claimed to head a ministerial committee investigation into the closure of the Gupta businesses’ bank accounts.
Zwane had his department release a statement about supposed Cabinet decisions, including the establishment of an inquiry into the banks, which turned out to not be endorsed by Cabinet at all.
According to Fin24, Zuma wanted Standard Bank’s application struck off the court roll.
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