The damage caused by state capture has yet to be fully quantified and goes far beyond just state-owned enterprises (SOEs), public enterprises minister Pravin Gordhan has said. According to Eyewitness News (EWN), Gordhan told MPs on Wednesday that state capture had also affected the functionality of SOEs.
He reportedly said the total damage to the functionality of SOEs was not yet fully quantified and said the damage caused went far beyond them.
"It's been a huge cost to the country. In recent years, we've got ourselves a reputation for instability within SOEs, but also for fairly rampant corruption," he reportedly said.
According to eNCA, Gordhan said his department wanted to determine exactly how much money was stolen, by whom and where it had gone to, so that it could be recovered.
"We need that money back in South Africa, so we want to put in place a process of collaboration, both amongst our own South African entities, but, if needs be, with others as well to actually recover the stolen funds from these entities," he reportedly said.
He reportedly said the department would monitor SOEs much more closely in the future, adding that monitoring had been "very weak" in the past, according to Business Day.
He said that in the past, the department had relied on quarterly reports from SOEs without more closely examining their revenue and expenditure streams.
"The kind of monitoring of the actual core business and finances of these state-owned companies by the department is generally weaker than it should be," he said.
Gordhan said the phrase "pay back the money" should be brought back, when addressing an Ahmed Kathrada memorial in March.
He reportedly said: "What we have seen since 2016 and more in the past year is how different components in our society have struggled against different forms of injustice... Those who want to benefit themselves; they do so in a fairly sophisticated way...
"We learnt about Bell Pottinger, the Gupta emails, and even today, it is fascinating to meet people whose names appear in the emails, but they say [they] don't know anything about it. Souls can today be bought for that cheap."