Pick of the week's articles

[Daily Maverick] Sunday, 01 October 2017 STORY OF THE WEEK [Blatant racism brings shame to Cosatu march]( By HERMAN MASHABA An open letter to Cosatu: It is time to stop this façade of being a trade union that has the best interests of working class South Africans at heart. Your sole mission is to play politics and ensure that the ANC maintains its control of the state purse. [SARS Wars: A year after Makwakwa scandal hit the headlines, his fate is still not spoken of]( More than a year ago, on 15 September 2016, SARS Commissioner Tom Moyane finally suspended Jonas Makwakwa, his then second-in-command, after the Financial Intelligence Centre had alerted Moyane that Makwakwa and his girlfriend, Kelly-Ann Elskie, had made 75 “suspicious” cash deposits worth R1.3-million into their personal bank accounts and flagging alleged fraud, corruption and money laundering. The slow pace of the Makwakwa matter has irked Parliament's finance committee as well as Scopa. “It’s complicated,” Moyane keeps telling us. Isn’t that exactly why the Hawks should be investigating and not SARS? By MARIANNE THAMM. [amaBhungane: How Gupta-linked firm scored big by connecting officials and consultants – whistle-blower]( Bianca Goodson, the former chief executive of a Gupta-linked consulting firm, has broken her silence 18 months after resigning in dismay. She has released a detailed statement and 65 annexures, charging that her former firm, Trillian Management Consulting, facilitated access to decision-makers for consulting multinationals McKinsey and Oliver Wyman. In return for this political capital, she states, Trillian was to get up to half the fees in lucrative consulting contracts with state entities. Goodson initially started preparing her statement for the expected parliamentary inquiry into state capture, but after repeated delays decided to make it public via the Platform for the Protection of Whistle-blowers in Africa (PPLAAF). By SUSAN COMRIE for AMABHUNGANE. [ANC Leadership Race: Gwede Mantashe makes his position well known]( It has been claimed before in this publication that this period before the ANC’s December leadership contest could turn out to be the most crucial time, that the twists and turns now occurring could be decisive to the result at the end of the year. After several months in which it appeared Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa was gathering steam, while Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma was stuck in first gear, Zweli Mkhize suddenly leapt from the starting gate. Then, over the weekend, ANC Secretary-General Gwede Mantashe got his oar in and started to row hard for Ramaphosa. It is turning into a topsy-turvy race in which almost anything could happen. By STEPHEN GROOTES. [Fracking flop – Karoo gas estimates ‘overcooked’ in more ways than one]( Unfortunately for shale gas exploration companies like Shell, a scientific study indicates that the Karoo shale deposits are “over-mature” (cooked to the point where most gas has disappeared). Commenting on the latest study, Treasure the Karoo Action Group (TKAG) chief executive Jonathan Deal says he is not in the least bit surprised by these results. By TONY CARNIE. [Editorial: What price forgiveness, KPMG?]( We are in the growing pains stage of democracy and many of the decisions and outcomes of the next few months will determine the trajectory of the country for the next 10-15 years. It is in the light of this reality that we need to consider how best to deal with the likes of KPMG. [Analysis: Team SA Finance not worth the taxi fare]( Team Finance on Tuesday put up such a poor showing at its media briefing that, if this reporter were an investor, he’d be loath to loan even taxi fare, never mind the billions of rand Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba urgently needs to bail out state-owned entities including SAA in three days’ time, without impacting negatively on the already painfully stretched national purse. By MARIANNE MERTEN. [Zeitz Mocaa: Cape Town’s new art museum stuns and provokes]( The past weekend saw the public opening of the Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa. A project unprecedented in its scale and ambition on the African continent, the museum was hailed at its opening as an “8th wonder of the world”. Attracting at least as much attention as the art it houses is the museum structure itself: a spectacular edifice carved out of existing grain silos. Supporters say the Zeitz Mocaa can spearhead a glorious new era for African art. Its detractors aren’t so sure. By REBECCA DAVIS. [Declassified: Apartheid Profits – Behind the Iron Curtain]( Welcome to the ninth installment of ‘Declassified: Apartheid Profits’. While researching the recently published book Apartheid Guns and Money: A Tale of Profit, OPEN SECRETS collected approximately 40,000 archival documents from 25 archives in seven countries. This treasure trove contains damning details of the individuals and corporations that propped up apartheid and profited in return. Many of these documents were kept secret until now. This week we take a look behind the Iron Curtain and discover that during the Cold War, all was not as it seemed. Apartheid’s alliances did not fit neatly into the narrative of the “Communist threat". [FORWARD THIS EMAIL TO A FRIEND]( Copyright © 2017 Daily Maverick, All rights reserved. You are receiving this mail because you are awesome and on the Daily Maverick First Thing subscriber list. [Preferences]( | [Unsubscribe](