EDITORIAL: The good work of Gordhan and the banks may come to nought
If there is one thing the disclosures about the Guptas and the banks tell us, it is that SA’s banks and its banking regulators are pretty good at noticing anyone who is moving large sums of money in a way that may break the law. Whether the law enforcement agencies that should prosecute the law-breakers can actually do so is far from clear, however. But in the case of the Guptas, the light of public and political scrutiny is at least being shone on the usually secret probes by banks and their regulators into dealings that may be dodgy. The country’s commercial banks have long had to have stringent "know your customer" measures in place and to monitor and report any unusual or suspicious transactions to the Financial Intelligence Centre (FIC), which looks out for money laundering or terror financing and approaches law enforcement agencies if it suspects these. When the big four banks closed the Gupta family’s accounts, and the accounts of Gupta-linked businesses earlier in 2016, it p...
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