Last Update: February 27, 2023, 16:51 IST
Johannesburg, South Africa
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa responds to a parliamentary debate on his Address to the Nation in Cape Town, South Africa (Image: Reuters)
Embarrassed South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said it was an opportunity to tackle dirty money, but opposition parties accused him and the ANC of supporting financial crimes.
President Cyril Ramaphosa said on Monday that South Africa would seize “an opportunity” to tackle dirty money after the country was placed on a watch list for financial crimes.
The Financial Action Task Force (FATF), a global watchdog, said on Friday that it has placed South Africa on its “grey list” to step up monitoring over deficiencies in combating “money laundering, terrorist financing and proliferation financing”.
The FATF sets standards for more than 200 countries and jurisdictions on cross-border financial crime – a system intended to encourage national authorities to improve their performance.
“The gray listing is an opportunity to strengthen our controls and improve our response to organized crime,” Ramaphosa said in his weekly newsletter.
“The situation is worrying but less serious than some people suggest,” he said.
“The fundamentals are in place and we know what we need to do to get out of the gray list,” Ramaphosa said.
South Africa’s territory was ravaged by corruption under former President Jacob Zuma, which Ramaphosa vowed to clean up when he took office five years ago.
The radical left-wing opposition party, the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), reacted strongly to the gray listing, lambasting Ramaphosa as “a criminal leading a criminal state”.
Ramaphosa “is part of the reasons why South Africa is greylisted,” it said on Friday.
South Africa and Nigeria were the only new entries to the “Grey List”, whose 23 members include the Cayman Islands, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Philippines, Syria and Yemen.
The listing is “another indictment on the failure of the ANC national government to deal decisively with financial crime,” John Steinhusen, head of the main opposition Democratic Alliance (DA), said on Twitter.
“When our current president has millions of US dollars hidden in his own sofa, the listing is not surprising,” Steenhuisen said, referring to an alleged coverup of a large-scale theft at Ramaphosa’s farm.
Corruption in South Africa has fueled a decline in support for the ruling African National Congress (ANC) ahead of 2024 elections – a decline that could cost Ramaphosa the presidency.
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(This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a syndicated news agency feed)