Oakbay: We never claimed Gordhan has power to intervene with banks

Cape Town - Oakbay Investments wants certain parts of Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan's founding affidavit to prevent him from intervening with banks on the company's behalf struck out.

Ronica Ragavan, acting CEO of Gupta-owned Oakbay Investments, states in an affidavit filed in the North Gauteng High Court on Friday that Oakbay regards certain material in Gordhan's affidavit as "irrelevant, scandalous and/or vexatious".

This includes a statement by Gordhan that there were continued assertions by Oakbay that he, as minister of finance, should intervene in or exert pressure upon the banks regarding their closure of the Oakbay accounts. Gordhan regarded these continued assertions as "harmful to the banking financial sectors, to the regulatory scheme created by law, the autonomy of both the government regulators and the registered banks themselves".

Ragavan alleges that this allegation by Gordhan is "patently false" as well as "scandalous and vexatious". She states that the Oakbay Group has never contended that Gordhan has the power to intervene or exert pressure on the banks regarding their closure of the Oakbay accounts.

READ: Gupta response to Gordhan under the microscope

Ragavan also wants a section in Gordhan's founding affidavit where he talks about "an increasingly serious state of affairs" regarding the number and scale of reported transactions linked to Oakbay struck out. He names as an example the reporting of R1.3bn as a suspicious transaction in terms of Fica. It relates to the Optimum Mine Rehabilitation Trust.

Furthermore, according to Ragavan, a certificate, which purports to record 72 "suspicious transaction reports" reported to the Financial Intelligence Centre under the Financial Intelligence Centre Act (Fica), has no bearing on the relief which is sought by Gordhan and is irrelevant.

Oakbay Group is also of the view that the exposition provided in the legal documents by Gordhan and the banks regarding local and international banking law is irrelevant for the purposes of the application.

Oakbay provides examples, including that there is "no universally agreed or accepted methodology by either governments or institutions which prescribes the nature and extent of a risk based approach".

READ: Oakbay CEO slams bank risk fears on Gupta accounts

FULL AFFIDAVIT