ABSA denies CR17 campaign donation

ABSA bank has rejected suggestions that it donated money to President Cyril Ramaphosa’s CR17 election campaign for the ANC presidency in 2017. This after ABSA Nation Building was listed by weekend newspaper reports as among those who helped fund the party’s 2017 leadership campaign and benefitted from government in business dealings.

Public Protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane found that Ramaphosa misled Parliament over the source of a R500 000 Bosasa donation. Ramaphosa claims the report itself is legally flawed.

ABSA spokesperson Phumza Macanda says ABSA Nation Building is not an entity belonging to the group.

“ABSA did not donate to the CR17 campaign. As a policy, we do not donate to political parties or politicians. We checked yesterday throughout organisation and I can confirm that there is no such entity under ABSA in the group.”

Political Analyst, Dirk Kotzé, says the public is correct in raising questions over how parties spend donations given to them for political campaigning.

Kotzé says there is no information about money used for other candidates.

“I think with the amounts of money; many people are asking where was the money spent, for what purpose was it spent, because this is hundreds of millions. And this was only one of the participants; at one stage, there were five or so more presidential candidates in the pipeline, plus other candidates like Ace Magashule and David Mabuza. The question is what happened with the money they received? There is no information about that.”