The ANC must disclose how much money they received from the controversial businessman Edwin Sodi and pay the money back to the Provincial Treasury
3 October 2020
Please find attached an English and Afrikaans soundbite by Dr Roy Jankielsohn MPL.
After Edwin Sodi accused the ANC NEC member and former Treasurer-General Zweli Mkhize of receiving money from him, Mkhize admitted that it was in fact the ANC that received millions of rands in donations from him. Mkhize is quoted in the press as folows: “I can confirm that during my tenure as the Treasurer General, Mr Sodi, just like many other business persons, companies and organisations made donations to the African National Congress”.
This statement by Mkhize confirms that the ANC has been a beneficiary of Free State corruption. The money that was channelled into the ANC coffers was meant to benefit the people of the Free State, many of whom are hungry, destitute and without basic services.
This confirms what the DA has been saying for more than a decade in the Free State Legislature, which is that many tenders and other government contracts in the Free State are allocated with strings attached. The conditions being that the individuals and companies have to fund the ANC’s election campaigns at the cost of the people of the province. The donations by Sodi to the ANC are but the tip of this financial iceberg.
It was also revealed through leaked emails in 2017 that the Gupta’s, who are linked to the controversial R380 million Vrede Dairy Project through the Estina Company, assisted the ANC election campaigns in the Free State after requests via Ace Magashule’s girlfriend Mosidi Motsemme and his son Tshepiso to Rajesh Gupta. The Gupta-linked Vrede Dairy Project stands alongside the Edwin Sodi corrupt asbestos contract as the most prominent corruption cases so far in the Free State.
As a beneficiary of corruption, the ANC has become an integral part of the criminal network of corruption, money laundering and fraud in our country.
The ANC has admitted that they are in possession of dirty money and have a legal obligation to disclose and pay the full amounts back to the state so that our people can benefit from it.
Issued by Roy Jankielsohn, Leader of the Official Opposition in the Free State Legislature, 3 October 2020
