The PAC says the National Treasury and South African Reserve Bank-imposed curatorship of VBS Mutual Bank is duplicitous, especially in light of recent scandals.

On Monday, 12 March, the Pan Africanist Congress of Azania (PAC) expressed its “disgust” at a recent decision by the National Treasury and the South African Reserve Bank to place VBS Mutual Bank under curatorship.

The party says it is dismayed by the decision of the “National Treasury as well as the Reserve Bank to oppress and suppress an African-owned VBS Mutual Bank. We have seen that African owned entities such as ANN7 have been purged, while the foreign entities such as ABSA, Steinhoff and now Enterprise are always protected because they are too white.”

Kenneth Mokgatlhe, who is the PAC’s spokesperson, is adamant that “the decision to purge VBS Mutual Bank is not only political but selfish, self-centred, and from people jealous to see African people organising themselves. It is now clear that some people do not want to see the fortunes of African people taking shape; these lethal individuals want to see African people being permanent beggars who cannot stand with their own feet.”

The PAC says it hopes that it the fortunes of African-owned entities in every sector of the economy can be turned around, “we want to see main players of the economy being African and not foreign as it is the case currently. Our government must take a sober decision and introduce economic policies, which in the truest sense seeks to transform the lives of the people through changing current ownership patterns as they continue to benefit the minority group since 1652 when the land was stolen from us.”

Mokgatlhe says the party is busy engaging with other political actors and civil-society groups to explore options on how they can collectively “exert maximum pressure on the South African reserve bank to reverse its decision.”