Green Gupta Pig
Acrylic Resin, Chroma Green acrylic Paint
40 cm x 70 cm x 28 cm
The first truth
Chroma green paint is used in visual effects to remove unwanted elements from an image. The technique has been used heavily in many fields, and perhaps the most interesting use recently, has been in the field of financial manipulation. The Gupta brothers, through their company Oakbay Resources, have used all sorts of tricks to hide their dealings, often in plain sight.
Oakbay Resources is currently suspended on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange.
Oakbay Resources is facing mounting challenges as media houses publish daily exposés from the #GuptaLeaks, a database of between 100 000 and 200 000 emails that reveal behind-the-scenes communications of the Guptas' many enterprises.
The family and their companies are the focus of intense scrutiny after allegations of state capture linking them to President Jacob Zuma, his son Duduzane and his political allies.
The sheer scale of corruption unravelled in the wake of the Gupta email leaks has been an eye-opener for many a South African. Just months ago, it would have been unthinkable that big global companies such as KPMG, Bain, SAP, McKinsey and Bell Pottinger would have found themselves entangled in Gupta kickback scandals.
A host of managers have been suspended and more trouble for these companies is possibly on its way. But the events have also signalled how it takes ‘Two to Tango’ when it comes to corruption. While government is constantly in the spotlight for taking bribes, businesses who have handed over those bribes have been less in the spotlight. All of that is now changing with the Gupta Leaks. South African businesses should take lessons from this and tighten up their ethics in future.
"The JSE has granted a request made by Oakbay Resources for a voluntary suspension of the listing of its securities, on a temporary basis; which will take place with immediate effect", Oakbay announced on the stock exchanges news service (SENS).
It cited the recent resignations of the company's sponsor, transfer secretary and an independent non-executive director (who was also the chairperson of the Company's Audit Committee) as having created significant uncertainty around the ability of the firm to continue to meet its future obligations in terms of the Listings Requirements.
"As a direct consequence of these circumstances, the Board believes that it would be in the best interests of the Company and its Shareholders that the listing of its securities on the JSE is temporarily suspended."
The company said the board of directors is in the process of evaluating several alternatives available to the company.
“Regarding accountability, management promise to take individual and collective responsibility to deliver on their undertakings while maintaining the strictest ethics.”
… I thank the members of the board and everyone present here for their belief, generosity, commitment and team work in making this listing possible. I hereby assure you all that our acts and future course of actions will be for the benefit of all shareholders and people of our country at large.
Our vision at Oakbay is to leverage, for the benefit of our stakeholders, one of the largest high quality uranium projects in Africa and the world in order to take advantage of rising uranium demand, while maintaining our exceptional safety record and helping build South Africa….
The second truth
Green is the colour for “Go!”
The New York Times says that South Africa’s inquiry into state corruption has gripped the nation with its glimpses into the byzantine ways power has been amassed and wielded within the African National Congress, the party that has run the country since the end of apartheid. Scheming politicians, powerful bankers and prominent officials have featured prominently in the ever-lengthening cast of characters.
“The inquiry’s leaders have rejected the Guptas’ offers to testify by video conference or other means — creating the possibility that a wide-ranging government inquiry determined to ferret out the truth will not hear from some of the main characters.
“I’m not saying that I’m not coming to the commission,” Ajay Gupta, the oldest brother, said in Dubai, where the family is now based. “I will, but not this moment.”
He added, “I want to clear my name.”
In his first extensive interview since leaving South Africa, Gupta, 53, “forcefully rejected accusations made in the hearings against his family, including that he and his brothers offered ministerial positions on the president’s behalf in return for favours”. “Instead of being the architects of government corruption — what has become known in South Africa as state capture — Mr. Gupta said his family was caught in the crossfire between rival ANC factions and their business allies.
Gupta claims the family was the victim of politically motivated law enforcement authorities and a witch hunt that could not stand scrutiny in court. “Despite the many accusations that his family essentially defrauded the government by siphoning off enormous sums of money from government contracts and other deals, Mr. Gupta noted that prosecutors had charged them only once, in a case involving a dairy farm.”
The South African judiciary comes in for a roasting from The New York Times. “In significant setbacks, prosecutors have twice failed to prove that the money siphoned from the dairy farm project, called Estina, directly benefited Mr. Gupta or other companies linked to the Gupta family. A high court judge released most of the assets frozen in the case in March, and the court ruled in favour of the companies linked to the Guptas again in May. A separate criminal case is still underway.”
“Was Ajay Gupta or Gupta family proven guilty? One place? One smallest thing?”
Over the years, Mr. Gupta said, countless senior politicians from the ANC and the opposition had visited his home. “Who did not come and meet me? Or I not meet with them?” Gupta asked the journalists. He added: “Meeting with people, there’s nothing wrong. Every business organisation meets with the politicians and the people.” In Dubai, Gupta argued that the commission was simply not interested in hearing his side of the story.
“In one of the most explosive hearings, a former deputy finance minister, Mcebisi Jonas, said Mr. Zuma’s son, Duduzane, took him to the Gupta residence in Johannesburg in late October 2015. Duduzane Zuma had worked for years for the Gupta family,” recaps The New York Times.
“There, Mr. Jonas said, a Gupta brother offered to make him the finance minister. “The Gupta brother, he said, offered to make him rich in return for favourable treatment in the position.
“Mr. Gupta repeated that they had information on me and that if I suggested that the meeting had occurred, they would kill me,” Jonas is reported as saying.
In the Public Protector’s 2016 report, says The New York Times, Jonas said that the Gupta brother who made him the offer was Ajay, the oldest. But in the recent hearing, Mr. Jonas said that he was “relatively certain” that it was Ajay. He raised the “possibility that it might have been Rajesh,” the youngest Gupta brother.
In the interview with The New York Times, Ajay Gupta said he was not home during the meeting between Jonas and Zuma’s son. His brother Rajesh “did not meet with Jonas at all,” Ajay Gupta said. “He just came into the room for a fraction of a second, and say hello to Dudu.”
“Nobody from the family was there,” he said.