Former lottery chair challenges Ramaphosa’s investigation

Former National Lotteries Commission (NLC) chair Alfred Nevhutanda has filed his final affidavit in his legal challenge to review and set aside President Cyril Ramaphosa’s authorisation of a Special Investigation Unit (SIU) probe into corruption at the commission.

The application, launched in 2024, has delayed the forfeiture of millions of rands worth of assets of people implicated in the looting of lottery funds.

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The matter will now be set down for argument in the High Court in Pretoria.

In his opposing affidavit, Ramaphosa stood firm on the legality of authorising the investigation in 2020 into “maladministration” at the NLC from January 2014 to October 2020.

The probe has led to the preservation of assets valued at R344 million, including a R27 million Pretoria mansion owned by Nevhutanda and allegedly bought with lottery grants.

Nevhutanda argues that the proclamation was unlawful because the NLC is not an organ of state and does not deal with public money, which he says are prerequisites under the SIU Act.

He says the proclamation is also too broad, giving the SIU license to “go on a fishing expedition, permitting it to turn over any stone to its heart’s content”.

Ramaphosa says there is no legal basis for Nevhutanda’s objections and the review is out of time.

The SIU argues that Nevhutanda’s true motive is to get back assets that have been preserved, prevent their forfeiture to the state, and avoid the consequences of his alleged crimes.

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In his replying affidavit, Nevhutanda says a perusal of the opposing affidavits did not show any evidence to refute his contention that Ramaphosa acted “irrationally” when he signed what he calls a “vague, broad and unlimited” proclamation. This, he says, is enough on its own for it to be set aside by the court.

“Given the intrusion into the personal rights of the vast number of grant recipients [14 627 over the relevant six years], the prejudice which stands to follow is manifest.”

He maintains that the distributing agencies, not the NLC board, awarded grant funding, and that the SIU has provided no evidence that the agencies contravened the Lotteries Act or engaged in “untoward conduct”. He says the SIU has made only “sweeping statements”.

Public money dispute

Nevhuntanda is persisting with his claim that the SIU was only permitted to investigate malpractice involving public money.

“If one has regard to the SIU affidavit, it is evidently in pursuit of money which was paid, by the grantees, to third parties. The money in the hands of the grantees does not constitute public money,” he says.

He adds that while unlawfulness can taint all subsequent transactions, the SIU has failed to show any unlawfulness within the distributing agencies.

Regarding the alleged lateness of his application, he says he was “taken aback” that he and the board had not been informed of the SIU investigation.

He says the Minister of Trade, Industry and Competition at the time had “been very much antagonistic towards the board” and “there also appeared to have been a concerted media effort to bad-mouth the business of grant funding”.

He says he had no problem with the investigation. He ran a “tight ship” but there was also room for improvement.

“Over time, however, my attitude slowly but surely changed. The personal attack on me, via the courts, the Special Tribunal and the media, was intense, but I endured it in the spirit that the highest tree catches the wind.”

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Nevhuntanda says he had not anticipated that service providers to the NLC would be targeted and that people were not prepared to stand up to the SIU.

He says he “came to seriously consider the possibility of the NLC being the SIU’s ‘cash cow’”.

He says he wished to live a “more subdued life” but now “single-handedly needs to stand up against the President” and state establishments, who litigate “funded by the state”.

“I came to the conclusion that the on-going SIU investigation is a travesty of justice and I had to step forward.”

The parties will now file heads of argument before approaching the court for a hearing date.

© 2025 GroundUp. This article was first published here.

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