Former SARS spokesperson
Every taxpayer cares about what happens at the South African Revenue Service, because Sars takes part of your earnings and places it in the public purse for use on government projects. In times of economic hardship, all but the wealthiest of taxpayers feel that tax deduction keenly. Hence taxpayers also look at those projects (such as the proposed nuclear build or the social welfare system) and wonder whether “their” money is being well spent.
After all, the public purse is there to fund projects that benefit all South Africans but particularly the poorest of the poor.
A week ago, the Mail & Guardian published a story about the doubts expressed about this year’s tax take by Sars and, in particular, about whether the numbers might be being tweaked in various ways during the process of assessment and collection.
This is officially known as “manipulating the debt book”, and Sars spokesperson Sandile Memela was given ample space in the M&G zto explain that Sars was not doing this, and the reader was left to weigh it up.
It is noteworthy that one response, soon after the story broke, came from the tax ombud, Judge Bernard Ngoepe. He noted that recently there had been a steep rise in complaints about Sars’s assessment and payout process, and he wanted the finance minister to authorise an inquiry into the situation.
It was mentioned in the finance minister’s budget speech that tax revenues had dropped by about R30-billion in the past year.
Remember that the speech took place against the background of a long-running war between Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan and the chief commissioner of Sars, Tom Moyane – a war that is still going on.
The M&G broke the story of leaked letters between the two, indicating that Gordhan was unhappy with Moyane, and that Moyane had begged the president to intervene in their disagreement.
But it’s more than a disagreement. It’s about things Moyane has done, which the minister asked him not to do – but Moyane did anyway. He restructured Sars and a large number of key specialists left the service.
Some analysts believe he has gutted Sars’s revenue collection capacity and its ability to tackle the big companies guilty of tax avoidance, let alone its ability to block the proceeds of organised crime. Thus it is plausible that tax receipts have dropped recently and, given Moyane’s previous behaviour, it is plausible that actions are being taken to fudge that fact.
He came in as Sars commissioner on a wave of publicity about a “rogue unit” at the heart of the institution, presented as a kind of conspiracy – against whom, though, was not really made clear. The “rogue unit” narrative was first floated by the Sunday Times, but it later had to be withdrawn and the newspaper had to apologise for publishing it. Proper journalistic procedures were not followed in putting together the relevant articles, and it all began to look like a set-up. It seemed to be a case of political agendas being played out, probably one of the favourites of underhand politicians – the smear campaign.
By all accounts, then, the “rogue unit” story was not true, but Moyane continued as though it had been, proceeding to try to purge Sars of anyone who might be seen as overly loyal to the old regime, which was set up by Gordhan when he was in charge of Sars.
The fact that the Hawks and the National Prosecuting Authority contrived to pin charges of fraud on Gordhan (and two of his leading Sars appointees) was clearly an action in line with the approach taken by Moyane – it was a war on the key supporters of the Gordhan-era Sars, a purge not unlike the purge of Mbeki-era high-ups after Jacob Zuma became president.
If, as seems to be the case, Moyane’s motive was not to improve the service or its business of tax collection, we have to ask what his real motives might be.