MTN court cases harm SA with slow torture

THE MTN Group, one of our biggest and most influential corporate entities, has a gigantic Iranian problem. This means that South Africa has a gigantic political problem.

- 

The incestuously intertwined worlds of big business, party financial interests, and facilitating state actors may come under uncomfortable and damaging scrutiny from two court actions that have left MTN scrambling. Because of MTN's close connections to the ANC elite — Mcebisi Jonas, a Struggle stalwart, former Finance deputy minister, and recently appointed special envoy to the US, is the present chair of MTN; his close political ally, President Cyril Ramaphosa, is a previous chair — the ultimate judicial findings may have explosive political reverberations.

The first is a recent New York District Court decision on a lawsuit filed in 2022. The second is a ruling this week by the South African Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA). Both cases revolve around MTN’s extensive business activities in Iran, which the US has designated as a state sponsor of international terrorism and imposed extensive sanctions upon.

The ANC has made no bones about its admiration for Iran and its support for Iran’s affiliates, Hezbollah and Hamas. The ANC, as a government, is a sturdy defender of Iran against human rights criticisms in global forums, and its diplomats echo Iran’s anti-Israel, anti-US sentiments. So, the last thing that South Africa needs now is any Iranian skeletons to come tumbling out of the cupboard.

JAUNDICED EYE

WILLIAM SAUNDERSON-MEYER

@TheJaundicedEye