ANN CROTTY: Calling business to account
The public is fed up with the fallout of crony capitalism
Corruption Watch’s David Lewis has lost enthusiasm for that once-great principle of being "innocent until proven guilty". There are two reasons it’s grating him: the criminal justice system has been so deeply corrupted it’s almost incapable of proving anybody innocent or guilty; and, if that legal system actually did work, those with money could invest in legal services to ensure justice was permanently delayed. Lewis voiced his frustrations just a day after Bernard Agulhas’s chilling interview with Chris Barron appeared in the Sunday Times. Agulhas, who is head of the Independent Regulatory Board for Auditors (IRBA), isn’t holding out much hope of a speedy resolution of the investigation into KPMG’s audit of Gupta-owned Linkway Trading. There is apparently a process, says Agulhas — a long-drawn-out one — that is likely to be made longer by the army of lawyers available to a well-resourced entity such as KPMG.
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