The National Prosecuting Authority says the country's law enforcement agencies have made significant progress in staving off the likelihood of greylisting.
SA faces being greylisted by the Financial Action Task Force [FATF] after weaknesses were identified in its mechanisms to tackle terrorism financing and money laundering.
NPA bosses who were appearing before parliament’s justice portfolio committee on Tuesday to account for the authority’s performance in the 2021/22 financial year said a lot had changed since the evaluation was done.
National director of public prosecutions Shamila Batohi said the review was conducted in 2019, a time when there was no political will to deal with corruption or state capture, or to deal with money-laundering cases.
“And since then, I can really say what has happened is truly remarkable and to impose greylisting on SA at this stage will be counterproductive to what FATF is trying to achieve,” she said.
DA MP Glynnis Breytenbach said it seemed to be inevitable that SA would be greylisted, pointing to the fact that the NPA did not meet its targets for prosecuting money-laundering cases during the period under review.
“We need more information on how the NPA intends to improve the money-laundering convictions and what high-level interventions they will employ to improve.”
Deputy national director of public prosecutions Rodney de Kock said since the evaluation report was done, and up until the end of March, 534 money-laundering cases had been finalised. The importance of the 534 speaks to the collaboration between the Financial Intelligence Centre (FIC), the Hawks and the prosecution, said De Kock.
An additional 72 money-laundering cases were on the court rolls, he said.
“A lot has been done to address particularly the issue of money-laundering but more needs to be done to address the issue of stand-alone money-laundering,” said De Kock.
Stand-alone money-laundering is where individuals are charged on money-laundering counts as stand-alone charges as opposed to charging individuals for money- laundering in relation to cases that involve other offences, explained De Kock.
“This is a challenge we identified — that these are the cases that are linked to other offences and that is why we sometimes have difficulty in getting those cases finalised speedily,” he said.
De Kock said the NPA was responsible for three of the outcomes in terms of the mutual evaluation report with many of the outcomes talking to the financial sector and to legislation applicable to the banks and other industry players that deal with cash, flows of money, trust funds and trust accounts.
He said the country was in a much better position than it was in 2019 and that it was better organised to respond to gaps in the financial system. Law enforcement agencies have been reorganised to co-operate better with each other and legislation has been developed that hopefully will be passed before the next evaluation happens.
De Kock said they depended on the FIC to provide better reports and analysis that will help law enforcement investigate.
“We have made significant progress in terms of that. We are confident that in the manner we have been able to organise ourselves now, we will be able to put up a good case to the evaluators when they meet us in January,” he said.
The FATF placed SA on greylist notice and put it under an observation period for a year after poor ratings in its “Mutual Evaluation Report” published in October 2021. SA has until this month to implement the FATF’s recommendations or face being greylisted in February.
SA failed in 20 out of 40 FATF standards and recommendations. In terms of the effective implementation of laws, SA failed all 11 outcomes. The evaluation was made soon after SA began to grapple with state capture and weaknesses in the NPA.
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Good progress made in staving off greylisting, says NPA
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The National Prosecuting Authority says the country's law enforcement agencies have made significant progress in staving off the likelihood of greylisting.
SA faces being greylisted by the Financial Action Task Force [FATF] after weaknesses were identified in its mechanisms to tackle terrorism financing and money laundering.
NPA bosses who were appearing before parliament’s justice portfolio committee on Tuesday to account for the authority’s performance in the 2021/22 financial year said a lot had changed since the evaluation was done.
National director of public prosecutions Shamila Batohi said the review was conducted in 2019, a time when there was no political will to deal with corruption or state capture, or to deal with money-laundering cases.
“And since then, I can really say what has happened is truly remarkable and to impose greylisting on SA at this stage will be counterproductive to what FATF is trying to achieve,” she said.
DA MP Glynnis Breytenbach said it seemed to be inevitable that SA would be greylisted, pointing to the fact that the NPA did not meet its targets for prosecuting money-laundering cases during the period under review.
“We need more information on how the NPA intends to improve the money-laundering convictions and what high-level interventions they will employ to improve.”
Deputy national director of public prosecutions Rodney de Kock said since the evaluation report was done, and up until the end of March, 534 money-laundering cases had been finalised. The importance of the 534 speaks to the collaboration between the Financial Intelligence Centre (FIC), the Hawks and the prosecution, said De Kock.
An additional 72 money-laundering cases were on the court rolls, he said.
“A lot has been done to address particularly the issue of money-laundering but more needs to be done to address the issue of stand-alone money-laundering,” said De Kock.
Stand-alone money-laundering is where individuals are charged on money-laundering counts as stand-alone charges as opposed to charging individuals for money- laundering in relation to cases that involve other offences, explained De Kock.
“This is a challenge we identified — that these are the cases that are linked to other offences and that is why we sometimes have difficulty in getting those cases finalised speedily,” he said.
De Kock said the NPA was responsible for three of the outcomes in terms of the mutual evaluation report with many of the outcomes talking to the financial sector and to legislation applicable to the banks and other industry players that deal with cash, flows of money, trust funds and trust accounts.
He said the country was in a much better position than it was in 2019 and that it was better organised to respond to gaps in the financial system. Law enforcement agencies have been reorganised to co-operate better with each other and legislation has been developed that hopefully will be passed before the next evaluation happens.
De Kock said they depended on the FIC to provide better reports and analysis that will help law enforcement investigate.
“We have made significant progress in terms of that. We are confident that in the manner we have been able to organise ourselves now, we will be able to put up a good case to the evaluators when they meet us in January,” he said.
The FATF placed SA on greylist notice and put it under an observation period for a year after poor ratings in its “Mutual Evaluation Report” published in October 2021. SA has until this month to implement the FATF’s recommendations or face being greylisted in February.
SA failed in 20 out of 40 FATF standards and recommendations. In terms of the effective implementation of laws, SA failed all 11 outcomes. The evaluation was made soon after SA began to grapple with state capture and weaknesses in the NPA.
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