SARS has issued a lengthy rebuttal of claims by the Mail&Guardian newspaper that a nephew of its commissioner, Tom Moyane, was granted a debt collection contract that could pay back R220m.
The M&G reported that Nhlamulo Ndhlela’s company, Lekgotla Outsourcing, was part of Lekgotla Trifecta Collections, which won a contract to collect billions in tax payer debt.
"A subsequent amaBhungane investigation has discovered the family relationship between Sars commissioner Moyane and Ndhlela, and that this was not disclosed to Sars’s bid adjudication committee on the mandatory conflict of interest form.
"Businessperson Mabayo “Joe” Ndhlela is Moyane’s brother and Nhlamulo Ndhlela’s father."
The SARS statement said: "SARS places on record that as a result of the deliberate non-disclosure by LTC, when the tender was awarded, its Commissioner was not aware that his nephew was a shareholder in LTC."
SARS said the report "contains factual inaccuracies and untruths. SARS thus wishes to set the record straight by presenting the correct chronology of events."
According to this "correct" chronology of events, "LTC with another 2 (two) service providers, was subsequently appointed to collect oustanding tax debt older than 4 (four) years for this Pilot Project".
SARS disputed that the fee could be as high as R220m.
SARS said it had investigated the award of the tender after it received "a media inquiry" and that it's investigation revealed that "LTC failed to disclose the relationship between 1 (one) of its shareholders, Mr Nhlamulo Ndhlela, and the Commissioner".
"Upon the matter being brought to the attenditon of the Commissioner, he immediately instructed to initiate the process to cancel the award to LTC with immediate effect."
However LTC disputed it had done anything wrong and the contract with Moyane's nephew remains in place.
"SARS has written to LTC to give them an opportunity until Monday, 17 October 2016 to terminate the contract by mutual consent, failing which SARS will commence with an urgent application to the High Court for the review and setting aside of the tender to LTC," the SARS statement said.
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