The extradition process of the Guptas has failed Photo The South African
South Africa – On April 7 the UAE’s state news agency, WAM, reported that Justice Minister Abdullah had turned down the extradition request for Atul and Rajesh Gupta based on a technicality. A technicality that Justice Minister Ronald Lamola believes does not exist. Even though he plans to appeal it, getting back the Guptas may not be a possibility.
During the extradition process, the UAE seemed to be cooperating with South Africa. However, this was not the case. If one looks at the timeline of arrests, one will find the UAE was saying one thing but doing the opposite, explained Ferial Haffajee, Daily Maverick journalist.
“They apparently arrested the brothers and then, they said, they acted in accordance with the extradition treaty. In fact if you read the details of what happened I don’t believe that they acted in good faith at any point. Our government, through our ambassador Saad Cachalia, constantly asked for updates on where the case was and it’s pretty clear they were fobbed off until this report appeared in Africa Intelligence which said the brothers had been spotted in Switzerland.”
On February 13 judgement was handed down but South Africa was not told about it, even when enquiry ws made about how things were going on February 20. To Haffajee, this shows clearly the UAE acted in bad faith and were never really trying to cooperate with South Africa.
South Africa can’t be blamed this time for the Guptas getting away
Oftentimes the first people to blame are those in government. According to the UAE, the extradition bundle was rejected because it was defective and contained a cancelled arrest warrant. There was also a case of the UAE having “concurrent money laundering laws”. However, South Africa was able to show this was not the case for both and their extradition request should have been accepted.
“There was a cancelled warrant but also the new warrant in the documents. The second is that when you have these double criminality laws, like there’s a money laundering offence that occurred in the UAE and in South Africa, so who prosecutes it? That’s usually subject to negotiation and information sharing and that clearly didn’t happen between the two countries.”
The next step is seeing how seriously South Africa addresses the situation with the UAE. As it stands right now, it is unlikely the Guptas will be touching down on South African soil. Haffajee is certain the brothers have left the UAE and are most likely in Vanuatu. An island nation that is a tax haven and very unlikely to hand them over.
To hear more from Ferial Haffajee on the Guptas and UAE, listen to the podcast here:
