Presidency confirms receipt of notice into public protector’s Bosasa probe

After delivering his State of the Nation Address (Sona), President Cyril Ramaphosa will have just more than 24 hours to respond to the public protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane’s investigation into allegations that he violated the executive ethics code.

Mkhwebane said that Ramaphosa is an implicated person in her investigation into the R500,000 donation he received from Bosasa boss Gavin Watson. The Presidency on Wednesday confirmed that the president has been served with a section 7(9) notice which is served to people implicated in a probe by the office of the public protector and that the president was a willing participant.

According to the presidency, Ramaphosa has requested that Mkhwebane give him until Friday, June 21, to respond to the notice. This will be a day after he delivered his first Sona as the president of the 6th administration.

“The president has further requested to exercise his entitlement to question the complainant, Mr [Mmusi] Maimane and several witnesses who had appeared before the public protector during the course of her investigation,” a statement from the presidency read.

Although it is not clear who the other witnesses are, BusinessLIVE reported that Mkhwebane had asked Ramaphosa to give her some of the questions he would like to ask.

“I have requested president Ramaphosa to provide the questions they would want to ask, so that I can determine whether it is justifiable to allow that,” Mkhwebane said.

Maimane asked Mkhwebane to investigate Ramaphosa whether he lied to parliament and if he deliberately failed to declare that he had received a donation from Bosasa when he declared his interests in parliament – something the president does once a year.

“I can confirm that [Ramaphosa] has failed to declare the clear conflict of interest that exists between himself, his son Andile, and the corrupt systems management company Bosasa,” Maimane said.

The president has been at pains trying to explain how the money he received from Bosasa was to fund his presidential campaign and was not linked to his son, Andile. This however, is not what Mkhwebane is probing. Mkhwebane is trying to determine whether Ramaphosa misled parliament and why Ramaphosa he did not declare this donation.

Source – SowetanLIVE

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