Mr Pravin Jamnadas Gordhan

Mkhize has the advantage of being a Zulu and has a long-standing relationship with Zuma despite tensions in recent years over the firing of two finance ministers, Nhlanhla Nene and Pravin Gordhan (AC Vol 58 No 8, Zuma's edifice starts to wobble, Gigaba raises sights still higher & New script in KwaZulu-Natal)...

) that the brothers had paid them for a report on a 'rogue' unit in the South African Revenue Service which was used to prepare the ground for the dismissal of Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan in March (AC Vol 58 No 8, Zuma's edifice starts to wobble)...

The firm also disowned a confidential report they prepared for the South African Revenue Services (SARS) in 2014, which stated that former finance minister Pravin Gordhan knew, or ought to have known, that a rogue investigations unit within the agency was spying on President Jacob Zuma and his allies (AC Vol 55 No 23, Hard times for the revenue service)...

Several top officials at the Treasury, seen as bulwarks against raids on state funds, have been sacked, while former Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan has faced renewed prosecution bids over a so-called 'rogue unit' in the tax collection office...

His targets are the most outspoken MPs, such as sacked Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan, former Tourism Minister Derek Hanekom, KwaZulu-Natal MP Makhosi Khoza and former Ekurhuleni mayor Mondli Gungubele...

DisasterAt the same event, former Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan warned that South Africa could be plunged into a decade of disaster unless urgent action was taken to root out the vicious cycle of patronage and corruption that has pushed the country into economic recession...

For much of that period, President Jacob Zuma had been indirectly attacking the then Finance Minister, Pravin Gordhan's, efforts to cut corruption and rein in state spending on mismanaged projects...

Former Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan had also begun to block state-owned companies from donating through proxies to the ANC, as part of his clean-up of the country's public finances, Africa Confidential understands...

The strategy was also used to claim that the recently sacked Finance Minister, Pravin Gordhan, his deputy Mcebisi Jonas, and the Treasury were controlled by 'white monopoly capital' and their interests...

He also claimed that he had sacked Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan to bring younger blood into government...