The Financial Mail and investigative journalism hub, amaBhungane, are heading to court in an effort to get access to former president Jacob Zuma’s tax returns during his time in office.
The court bid stems from a request made in February 2019 by the publication to see Zuma’s tax from 2010 to 2018 under the Promotion of Access to Information Act (PAIA). The request was made because of serious allegations made in the media about the state of Zuma’s tax affairs.
However, SARS declined to acquest to the request of the Financial Mail under the grounds of “unreasonable disclosure of personal information.” The request for access to the tax records was also declined upon an investigation in an internal appeals process.
Turning to the legal system, Financial Mail and amaBhungane will argue in court that there is a legitimate public interest in seeing the tax records and that under certain unique circumstances tax records should be made available for scrutiny.
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