Legal expert suggests MTN financial statements misrepresent risk of United States terrorism cases

THERE are concerns that MTN Group may have misled its shareholders about the nature of ongoing terrorism litigation in the United States in the recently published Annual Financial Statements for the year ended 31 December 2024.

- MICHAEL WALSH

The Annual Financial Statements names five active legal cases related to the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA) against MTN Group in US courts, and its Director's Report declares that each of those cases has “been assessed as remote and therefore no contingent liabilities have been disclosed.”

The Annual Financial Statements were authorized by the MTN Board of Directors on 17 March 2025. The Chairman of the MTN Board is Mcebisi Jonas, the newly appointed South African Special Envoy to the United States.

Professor Jeffrey Breinholt of George Washington University helps to shed light on why the Director's Note could pose problems for MTN Group and, by extension, the Government of South Africa.

Breinholt is a former US government official who spent over two decades working on counterterrorism and national security law in the US Department of Justice. He is also the editor of “Pursuing terrorists in US civil courts: the Encyclopedia of ATA cases.”