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INLSA<\/p>\n
Businesswoman Shauwn Mpisane, pictured here at a celebration to renew her wedding vows in March 2011, is challenging Sars over tax evasion charges against her.<\/p>\n
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The flashy lifestyle of then-metro policeman S\u2019bu Mpisane \u2013 and how he was funding his plush house and many expensive cars \u2013 was what sparked the interest of the taxman. <\/p>\n
And when it emerged that he was being supported by his wife Shauwn Mpisane, whose lifestyle was funded by her Zikhulise Cleaning, Maintenance and Transport CC, Sars officials turned their attention to the government-tendering housing company, it emerged in papers in the Pretoria High Court on Tuesday. <\/p>\n
The company and Mpisane \u2013 a wealthy businesswoman who admits to being politically connected \u2013 will stand trial in the Durban Regional Court in June, on charges of ripping off the taxman by R4.7 million. <\/p>\n
But on Tuesday she scored a first-round victory over Sars when the Pretoria court declared the decision by the taxman to revoke Mpisane\u2019s business tax clearance certificate to be of no force or effect. <\/p>\n
This is an interim order pending an application she will soon bring for the court to review and finally set aside the decision by Sars to cancel or revoke the certificate \u2013 a decision she says would ruin her \u201csocially significant business\u201d, which employs 1 000 people, because it means she cannot apply for government tenders. <\/p>\n
It emerged in the papers before Acting Judge Gregory Wright that in spite of the pending trial and the fact that she had a previous conviction for tax fraud, her company was still receiving tenders. <\/p>\n
In fact, she discloses that at present she is receiving R17m a month from the eThekwini municipality \u2013 which would have stopped at the end of this month had yesterday\u2019s application not been successful. <\/p>\n
Mpisane said in her court papers that the tax certificate had been \u201cmaliciously\u201d revoked on March 16 this year amid allegations that she was not tax compliant. <\/p>\n
She said she believed she was up to date with her tax returns and that the Sars actions were \u201centirely politically motivated\u201d. <\/p>\n
\u201cSars is set on destroying my business,\u201d she claimed, alleging that the Hawks and Sars representatives had made an \u201cunprecedented\u201d visit to the eThekwini municipality municipal manager and other senior officials two weeks ago. <\/p>\n
\u201cThey said they wanted to know why the municipality was making payment to Zikhulise as they were aware that there were criminal charges pending. They advised that the tax clearance certificate was invalid. This was pursuant to a campaign of victimisation against me.\u201d <\/p>\n
Mpisane also alleged that a Sars official had tried to bribe her to \u201cmake the audit go away\u201d and she had met him at the Beverley Hills Hotel, where closed-circuit TV cameras would have recorded the meeting. <\/p>\n
She then reported it to Sars but was then advised that the camera footage was corrupt. <\/p>\n
But Sars specialist investigator Yegandren Mundie says in his affidavit that Mpisane never made an affidavit about this and said the \u201cfootage was of little value\u201d. <\/p>\n
While accepting that the pending criminal charges were not an issue to the award of a tax clearance certificate, he accused Mpisane of failing to disclose on her application that the company had been under audit. <\/p>\n
He accused Zikhulise of owing about R4 million to the taxman, not submitting certain returns for the 2011 tax year and of \u201cnot being tax compliant\u201d. <\/p>\n
He said Mpisane\u2019s claims that she had gone to Sars in 2008 \u201cfor peace of mind\u201d and invited an audit were untrue. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe audit investigation was as a result of the decision taken to broaden the ambit of the tax investigation that commenced with an investigation into her husband (S\u2019bu Mpisane),\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
He said when they wanted to question the Mpisanes, their lawyer asked for indemnity because Shauwn Mpisane had a previous conviction for VAT fraud. No indemnity was granted. <\/p>\n
Mundie said the Hawks had attended the meeting with city officials \u201c to investigate alleged corruption concerning contracts with the municipality\u201d and to assist Sars investigators looking at \u201callegations concerning a tax clearance certificate which may have been forged for the 2003 year\u201d. <\/p>\n
He also disclosed that Sars was investigating tax debts of another company, Ukhozi, in which Mpisane was involved, which owed R12 million \u201cto the fiscus\u201d for which Mpisane could be held personally liable. <\/p>\n
In his judgment after hearing argument yesterday, Judge Wright said the court did not need to decide at this stage whether the decision by Sars to revoke the tax certificate was reviewable or not. <\/p>\n
He said Mpisane had made out a case for an interim order, which would mean that her tax certificate would remain in force for now. <\/p>\n
He questioned how Sars could revoke the tax certificate without prior notification, which would afford Mpisane the opportunity to make representations beforehand. <\/p>\n
Sars was not prepared to comment on the effects of the judgment on other taxpayers whose certificates had been revoked. Spokeswoman Karen Nelmapius said they would first study the judgment. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
INLSA Businesswoman Shauwn Mpisane, pictured here at a celebration to renew her wedding vows in March 2011, is challenging Sars over tax evasion charges against her. The flashy lifestyle of then-metro policeman S\u2019bu Mpisane \u2013 and how he was funding his plush house and many expensive cars \u2013 was what sparked the interest of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[8275,953,2143],"class_list":{"0":"post-10871","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-durban","8":"tag-newspaper","9":"tag-the-mercury","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10871","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10871"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10871\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10871"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10871"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10871"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}