KPMG Uses Dodgy News Report To Lie In Rogue Unit Rumpus

In a desperate bid for survival, the auditing giant lied to MPs and Saica, falsely blaming its former head of forensics for having to withdraw part of its SARS rogue unit report.

FORMER FORENSIC ACCOUNTANT AT KPMG, Johan van der Walt, did not copy-and-paste findings drafted by SARS attorneys into his report on the existence of a rogue spy unit within the South African Revenue Service.

The allegation that SARS’s attorneys had dictated the findings and recommendations that appeared at the end of KPMG’s supposed-to-be independent report and that KPMG had simply copied-and-pasted them from a memorandum compiled by the attorneys – was first made two years ago by the Daily Maverick, misguidedly it now transpires. Recently the charge has been resurrected by KPMG itself, against some of its former senior employees, prompting critics to ask: might the reborn charge against auditor Van der Walt, be a reckless ploy by the fallen-from-grace auditing giant to find a scapegoat and stem the flow of multi-million-rand clients who are deserting the sinking ship?

In March this year KPMG’s new forensic head, Roy Waligora, told Parliament’s standing committee on finance that KPMG had lost its objectivity and independence when Van der Walt went “off the grid” and inserted findings by attorneys Mashiane Moodley Monama (MMM) into the final draft of his report three years ago.

But Noseweek can reveal that it was – mostly – the other way round: attorneys MMM had copied Van der Walt’s findings and conclusions scattered about an earlier draft of the auditor’s report, and “pasted” them into their subsequently compiled summary, to be placed at the end of the report.

In his report Van der Walt concluded that an illegal rogue unit had operated within SARS and set out the evidence for this finding. That evidence has not been challenged.

But now, it seems, skullduggery and lies are the order of the day to obfuscate, pass blame and muddy the waters.