Pravin Gordan's no-knowledge of letter is misleading
Pretoria – The Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation (DPCI), commonly known as the Hawks, has noted with concerns the utterances by the Minister of Finance Mr Pravin Gordhan that he was not aware of the letter sent to him, detailing the 14th March 2016 at 16:00 as his deadline for answering questions sent to him.
The Hawks do not engage people on public space but the Minister has left us no choice but to clear the air, set the record straight and restore public’s trust on us as an elite crime fighting unit.
On 19 February 2016 the National Head of the Hawks Lieutenant General Mthandazo Ntlemeza sent a letter to Mr Pravin Gordhan. The letter contained questions which the Minister had to answer on or before 16:00 on 1 March 2016, so that we could continue with our investigations into the alleged rogue unit at SARS.
The minister received the letter, but instead of providing us with answers he sent us a written response via his legal representatives, Gildenhuys Malatji Attorneys.
In the letter the minister requested more time to answer questions, saying by the time he received the questions he was busy preparing the budget speech. The letter from his attorney was received by this office on 1 March 2016, approximately an hour before his 16:00 deadline.