ROB ROSE: A bloody nose for bullying credit regulator
Disturbingly, the National Credit Regulator seems to have the same degree of respect for a free press you’d expect to find in Russia
It’s a disturbing outline of one of the most blatant tales of abuse of state power in recent times — one that underscores a disturbing intolerance for freedom of speech from within government institutions.
On a cloudy winter’s morning on August 14 2014, three unidentified men pitched up at the house of debt counsellor Deborah Solomon in Brackenfell, Cape Town. They were aggressive, shouting to be let in, repeatedly rattling and kicking her gate. The only people at the house were Solomon’s elderly parents, who were badly rattled. "It was enormously traumatic for my parents. I was in a meeting at the time, but my neighbour called to ask what was happening at my house. For more than five hours, those men refused to identify themselves," she says today. Then they went to Solomon’s office and tried to muscle their way in. Eventually, Solomon arrived and figured out that the men were "investigators" with the National Credit Regulator (NCR). They said her registration as a debt counsellor with the regulator entitled them to search her premises. They stayed at her office, demanding files, until 7pm.It’s a disturbing outline of one of the most blatant tales of abuse of state power in recent ti...
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