Ramaphosa Public Protector

Photo: Fabrice Coffrini / AFP

Ramaphosa’s lawyers question Public Protector’s investigation methods

Cyril Ramaphosa’s court representatives have claimed the Public Protector may have obtained financial documents in her Bosasa report illegally.

Ramaphosa Public Protector

Photo: Fabrice Coffrini / AFP

Lawyers for President Cyril Ramaphosa have moved to have court documents containing financial information of donors to the CR17 campaign sealed because they believe the banking details could have been obtained illegally by the Public Protector.

Ramaphosa’s urgent plea

As a result, they have made an urgent application to the North Gauteng High Court to have the documents concealed, which is scheduled to be heard on Monday 12 August.

Ramaphosa’s lawyer, Peter Harris, showed that Absa Bank had never received a subpoena to release the information and the Public Protector’s own report never mentioned a subpoena of Standard Bank either, which casts a long shadow over how her office came into possession of the information.

“We submit that the bank statements of EFFG2, Linked Environmental Services, Ria Tenda Trust and the Cyril Ramaphosa Foundation accounts contain confidential information which must be protected in terms of the abovementioned provision,” he wrote in a letter to deputy judge president Aubrey Ledwaba, according to Times Live.

“We have reason to believe that certain of the abovementioned documents may have been unlawfully obtained by the public protector.

“In addition, in the report, the public protector does not state that she subpoenaed bank records from Standard Bank. Therefore, it is unclear how the public protector obtained the bank records of the Ria Tenda Trust.”

Peter Harris

Public Protector about to reveal evidence

The reason behind all of this is that Public Protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane is on the verge of filing all of the evidence they used to come to their conclusions in the Bosasa report.

In her report, she found Ramaphosa had lied to Parliament and, as a result, the President approached the North Gauteng High Court to interdict the report and block the recommended remedial action.

A defeated Mkhwebane said she would not be challenging the interdict but would hand over all of the documents from the investigation to the court.

Once this happens, the details of anyone and everyone who donated to the CR17 campaign will become public knowledge and this is the fact that has caused Harris’ last-minute plea to have the documents sealed.

Small wins

The records becoming public knowledge would be a small but significant victory for the beleaguered Public Protector, who has been on the wrong end of a series of legal blows in recent times.

In the latest ruling, the court lambasted Mkhwebane for allowing emotions to cloud her judgment.

“It is mind-boggling why in this matter, the Public Protector did not even consent to the declaratory order, to have the remedial action stayed, pending the outcome of the review application,” the judge said.