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Companies are losing up to 20% of revenues to fraud

Tying The Tourniquet
‘CFO Talks’ interviews Jacques van Wyk from JGL Forensic Services

Fraud examiner, Jacques van Wyk, outlines various scenarios where fraud commonly occurs in business and highlights the necessity to look for red flags, especially from the most trusted employees.

Listen to the interview here – https://cfotalks.com/podcast/30-jacques-van-wyk/[/vc_column_text][vc_row_inner][vc_column_inner width=”1/3″][vc_column_text]Jacques van Wyk[/vc_column_text][/vc_column_inner][vc_column_inner width=”1/3″][vc_column_text]Jacques van Wyk Interview[/vc_column_text][/vc_column_inner][vc_column_inner width=”1/3″][vc_column_text]Jacques van Wyk Interview2

Ciaran Ryan

This is CFO talks and today I am very happy to be joined by Jacques van Wyk, a certified fraud examiner and managing director of JGL Forensic Services. He’s been involved in several high-profile investigations into fraud and has been contracted to carry out numerous investigations in various capacities by, for example, National Treasury, National Department of Justice, Limpopo Province, Department of Transport and including the South African Revenue Services, The Jazz Foundation, Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning, and many, many others. Welcome, Jacques.

Jacques van Wyk

Thank you for having me on your show, Ciaran.

Ciaran Ryan

You’re very welcome. I think it goes without saying that fraud has become a fairly major part of corporate life in South Africa, we seem to read about little else in the press these days. From your perspective, how bad is the problem and how does it compare with, say, ten years ago?

Jacques van Wyk

I’m going to answer the second part first and then we’ll come back to the first part, if you look from 2009 to 2019, in terms of the economy, there’s been very low growth, we have real inflation a lot higher than salary increases, we have high levels of unemployment and people being retrenched. So those factors are very conducive to create an environment where people are more prone to fraud, either because they are economically forced into it or by opportunity. So I think we face a much bigger challenge at the moment than ten years ago because of the environment and also the political uncertainty, the economy. So yes, we are looking at levels way past the 5% or 10% or 15% in companies, which are the numbers that are being thrown around out there. It’s very difficult to have exact numbers in terms of research but I think companies lose on average 5%, 10%, up to 20% sometimes of their revenue to fraudulent activities.

Ciaran Ryan

Five to 20% of revenue lost to fraud?

Jacques van Wyk

Yes.

Ciaran Ryan

Have you seen that in practice?

Jacques van Wyk

We have seen companies close down, when they realise what was going on within the organisation it was too late to turn the ship around because the thing with fraud is it normally takes 18 months to sometimes up to four or five years before it’s discovered by accident or by a whistle-blower. By that time the damage and loss has grown, and also exponentially, if you look at fraud, normally it follows an exponential curve, it starts off small, they get away with it and then people get more brazen, their needs are greater and then the amounts become bigger and bigger. It’s an iceberg, you see the tip and there’s a huge amount of ice underneath the surface, which eventually sinks the organisation.

Fraud occurs across all levels of employees

Ciaran Ryan

Goodness gracious, for CFOs listening to this, their internal audit teams may be on the lookout for instances of fraud, but we know oftentimes they pick it up when it’s too late, you’ve already mentioned that, 18 months or two years have passed. Can you outline a few scenarios where fraud most commonly occurs and provide some guidance on where CFOs should be looking?

Jacques van Wyk

Excellent question, it’s not limited to one area, at the lower levels we find small amounts but high frequencies. We go to high levels, you look at the C&D levels, a lot more complex, bigger amounts involved.

Ciaran Ryan

Sorry, C&D, what is that?

Jacques van Wyk

You’re looking at your CFO, COO level, CEO, directors and then your FDs, your MDs and those levels. So your top senior levels. At the lower levels you find people changing banking details on debtor statements, so they receive the money in their bank account, and they manipulate the accounting system, or they abuse the company credit card, fuel, parts, those types of things. They create false suppliers and they can manipulate the payment system so that there’s small but regular frequent payments to small suppliers that is under the level that internal auditors are looking at. Then you go at higher levels, where there is more planning involved, so we know that our company is going to expand, I have an agreement with an external party to buy the ground, we inflate the price, we share the profit or I award a contract to you or I manipulate the process and there’s a finder’s fee or a handler’s fee that goes back via a friend or a family member, so the amounts are different. So it’s not a case where you can say, well, if you focus at the lower levels or the higher levels. The one thing that stands out at the moment, if I look at our cases in the last few years, it’s those employees who have been in your employment for many years, they know the systems, you trust them implicitly, they don’t take sick leave and you rely on these people and you can sign this or are authorised to do this and then people become used to them having some quasi authority because they speak on behalf of a very important or position within the organisation. We find that when the opportunity arrives, people do things and they get away with it, they realise that the system did not pick it up or they could explain it away and then it grows. That’s where it starts.

Ciaran Ryan

Okay, we were talking off air about one case where you were investigating fraud in a company and you mentioned, I think it was credit card fraud, but there was no obvious pattern, except for one particular thing, at four o’clock on a Friday this person would purchase something from a particular store, tell us about that.

Jacques van Wyk

Absolutely, when we profile people, we live in a very data-rich environment, if you look at your cell phone usage, your social media usage, your emails, even your car’s GPS system, and it’s a lot of information. In this particular case we couldn’t track down the person, they disappeared after taking a lot of money with them. We then got access to the information via the right channels and we analysed the data, and we were able to pick up certain patterns and then through predictive analysis we were then able to narrow down to the person’s behaviour and movements and this particular behaviour point stood out. So we waited for the person in store, they arrived at the predicted time in that time slot and they were awarded with a free set of bangles. So you must make technology work for you and we are able to do that. Our industry evolves, we use a lot of technology, I think it’s always a balance between the old-fashioned approach, going through pages, and then also using technology to be cost effective for your client.

‘People defraud companies because of circumstances’

Ciaran Ryan

In a case like that where you’ve been tracking somebody who is defrauding the company, you can’t track them down, then you eventually got hold of them, is there any joy in that because the money has been stolen, it’s been squandered, you’re not going to get it back, right?

Jacques van Wyk

You are right, it’s a small celebration. I think as South Africans we are very despondent, we wake up in the morning and we look at the news and it’s fraud and corruption. We see the poverty, the real victims at the end of the day are the poorest of the poor. Companies are not making money, they’re not making profits, they’re not paying taxes, the fiscus is under pressure, our debt burden rises. So it’s a small victory and you get some joy out of it. You are right, I’ve not in 18 years been able to catch someone who said Jacques, I’ve invested the money wisely, I had a return of 14% after cost, here is the bank account, here is the money. It’s the normal outage of fast cars, fast women and slow horses. People can’t sit on ill-gotten gains. So it’s sad, currently people defraud companies because of circumstances, a partner lost their job, financial pressures and you get people who want to maintain a lifestyle. So it brings joy, I must be honest, it’s a small win but there’s a sad part to it. I think our criminal justice system is failing us as well, if you look at the conviction rate, even if you do a good investigation, a good report, and you’re successful in civil recovery, we don’t see people going to jail, we don’t see people paying for those crimes and we need to make examples. Until we get that right it’s a tradeoff, risk versus reward, so I’m going to take this risk, I’m going to have the reward and if there’s a 3%, 5%, 10% chance of me being convicted, the odds are in your favour.

Ciaran Ryan

I’ve seen that, it happened to a friend of mine, it was a small company defrauded of about R6 million by exactly that type of person you were talking about, trusted, knew exactly how the company runs, had access to the bank account. R6 million stolen and it just broke his heart and it broke his life.

Jacques van Wyk

Absolutely, R6 million for a small organisation, from a cash flow perspective, it breaks you. We’re not in a booming economy where financial institutions are saying we are willing to take a risk with you. The first question is, give us the numbers. Okay, the numbers look good, but you don’t have cash flow, how are you going to sustain your organisation, to trade out of such a loss. You talk about R6 million, some companies can’t survive with a R500 000 loss, a R200 000 loss, so it’s not the number that breaks the organisation, it’s the impact of that, not being able to recover from that. So now you say to people you’ve lost money, get an investigator, I’ve already lost money, now you want me to spend money on a grudge purchase and there’s no guarantee that they are going to be able to recover my money either through a civil process, and criminal processes take forever. So my heart goes out to that friend of yours.

Ciaran Ryan

By the way, the person never went to jail, they were never even charged.

Jacques van Wyk

There are so many of those stories out there and I say again, then people lose faith in the justice system. They did wrong, why weren’t they punished. But we’ve also become a society, you look at driving as a simple example, people don’t stop at stop streets anymore, they slow down and look because we are so focused on going after the big crimes. So it’s fine, if I go over the stop street I don’t stop, that’s fine, I won’t get prosecuted. If I get a ticket, it’s fine. So as a society we have moved our moral lines, where it’s more about not being caught out versus doing the right thing. Now, you pull that back to fraud, so as long as I don’t get caught, if I don’t steal too much, as long as I can justify. We have seen overseas the broken windows theory, if you deal with the small issues. There are no consequences in South Africa at the moment for wrongdoing or at least that’s the perception out there and that makes people more brazen.

Ciaran Ryan

Right and I think the viewpoint is that if the guys at the top are able to get away with what they can get away with, I’m going to just go through this red robot, a robot in South Africa is a traffic light.

Jacques van Wyk

You’re right, people look at the top. For me, leadership, people talk about how do we change and how do we turn this around, leadership, you learn by example. It’s no good that we tell people that you should be ethical and do the right thing but we look at our leaders and they live the good life, they spend the money in companies, they go on long weekends and golfing weekends and they take their girlfriends away, and you say to me, we’re not going to pay for coffee and milk anymore at the office. So we have this big disconnect. For me, you turn this around by leading by example.

Ciaran Ryan

I have to give you a story of my own, if you don’t mind, on this particular thing. Many years ago I worked with a German consultant, he was a very experienced businessman, I was quite young at the time but I learnt a tremendous amount from him. We were brought into a company, again owned by a German guy, and it was producing heating elements, it was here in Johannesburg. So the owner of the company, being a German, thought he’d hire another German because we kind of understand each other. Come in and find out what is the problem with my company, that was basically the brief. So we worked there, I did the figures and we grinded away for six weeks. After six weeks we called the managing director of the company and my partner at the time said to him, we have found the problem. He said that’s great news and my partner said, it’s you. It turned out the guy had a gambling problem. There were 200 people working in the company, but he was squandering the company money on this gambling thing and endangering the lives of those people who worked with him and their families. What happened is he eventually ran away and he left the country but the jobs were saved.

Jacques van Wyk

I’m glad for the jobs but the story that you’ve just told, I can go through our case files and I can take out many more of those. We always say do as I say and don’t do as I do. If we are going to turn this ship around, we need to set ethical leadership and lead by example because the fish rots from the head down. So we must be seen to be doing the right thing, set examples, there must be consequence management. Something that I want to leave with your listeners is that move away from the reactive environment to the proactive environment, check your suppliers, check your clients, check your staff on a regular basis, it’s a lot cheaper.

Suppliers and clients with malicious intent

Ciaran Ryan

When you say check your suppliers or your staff, what do you mean by that?

Jacques van Wyk

Suppliers, they might be part of syndicates, they might be setting you up for a big loss. It’s the same with your clients, they might be engaging you to understand how you function, what drives your sales, are you target-driven, what is the value, can I have a close relationship with your staff and spin out your company and clone your company. It’s the same with your staff, if the staff are in financial distress, they are a lot more likely to commit fraud. So be proactive and see those potential risks. I’m not saying that we don’t all have difficult times financially but if you get garnishee orders, if you get phone calls through the switchboard, if somebody is living a lifestyle that’s way above their salary, we should be alert to the environment.

Ciaran Ryan

Those are the red flags.

Jacques van Wyk

Social media, that new car on social media but how could Jacques afford that, given his salary, given his circumstances. If we are a lot more in tune with the environment and because we live in such an information-rich environment, we can pick up potential red flags and look at those. Systems and controls have got a function and a role to play but they are not 100% and because technology evolves and because people understand that once you don’t pick up something small that they can exploit it and grow it. So controls must evolve over time, we must be alert to the environment, like I say, from clients to suppliers to the your own staff, even your own management team. Sometimes a good dose of skepticism is not a bad thing. Once the horse has bolted, once the money is lost, it’s a lot more difficult than being proactive. So rather spend R10 on the proactive side, train your staff, be sensitive, have whistle-blower or fraud lines, have those things in place. But train people, make them aware versus being reactive at the end of the day. So we should really shift and say, let’s empower and be proactive and when it does happen, we catch it earlier, we limit the loss and let there be consequences.

Ciaran Ryan

Would you say fraud is worse in the public than in the private sector or is it just very general? If you look at Bosasa, which is a company here in South Africa, that had agreements with the prison services to provide services in all our prisons, and we now know because there’s an inquiry into state capture that big bags of cash were just being dished out all over the place to get those contracts. So you really have this network between private and public sector, you alluded to that a moment ago, maybe these suppliers are trying to get very close to your staff and they’ve been amazingly successful, it seems, in South Africa in doing that.

Jacques van Wyk

Absolutely, it is not worse in the public sector versus the private sector. I think the private sector does an excellent job in reputation management, keeping it under wraps. So it’s easier to highlight it in the public sector but you need a corruptor and you need a corruptee, at least two to tango. Absolutely, you have business and money, you have government with a lot of spend but even in the private sector you find that companies prey on other companies as well. So I don’t think the one is worse than the other. I think the one just manages the bad news a lot better and we put those MBA terms on it, reputation management, we’re proactively looking at this, we will give feedback. Whereas government is a lot more exposed, they’re slow in managing the news to the market and because of that you find those relationships where companies see an opportunity and they grow those relationships. Nobody walks into any situation and says, I’m going to give you

R1 million, you give me the R10 million contract. It’s over time, it starts with the whiskey and the golf and paying for a vacation, people get comfortable. I always equate it to that first date, the first time you kiss someone, that awkwardness, am I doing it right. Then over time you know what your partner likes, what they prefer, and you get comfortable. It’s the same with fraud and corruption, we get comfortable, we grow the relationship and it’s now not the R10 million contract, it’s now the R500 million contract and we give you the information, and you can draw up the specs. Relationships grow over time, it’s very seldom that you find that once-off I walk in, I give you a box full of cash, you give me the contract, you manipulate the process, it grows over time, it matures over time.

Ciaran Ryan

It’s a grooming process.

Jacques van Wyk

It is absolutely a grooming process and you bring people on board. Jacques might be hesitant initially and say, guys, I don’t think we’re doing this right, it must be a fair process. Then you say but in terms of the company to grow and be successful, this is the unspoken way we do things. Slowly but surely you bring your own people on board. You shift that line, that thin grey line between black and white, which is right, and which is wrong, that grey line shifts and it grows and then it becomes morally justifiable. Once it’s been justified, we employ 15 000 people, we’re impacting on 60 000 people’s lives, then it’s very easy to justify that R500 million contract. By the way, we do deliver a good product, yes, maybe somebody else could do it 10% cheaper but we do a good product. So all those rationalisations kick in at the end of the day and then it’s justifiable.

Social media and big data provide vital information

Ciaran Ryan

What about lifestyle audits, these are quite a powerful tool in the hands of tax inspectors, I guess for fraud investigators as well. That’s where you compare the lifestyle of a person to their declared earnings, it’s a dead giveaway, a red flag, isn’t it? Is this something you look for in your work?

Jacques van Wyk

Absolutely, we talk about interested parties, people who we believe might be potentially involved, because of social media and big data there is so much information available there. As I said earlier, fast cars, fast women and slow horses, people like to share that, look at the new car…

Ciaran Ryan

They can’t keep off Facebook.

Jacques van Wyk

They can’t, they just cannot do that.

Ciaran Ryan

Here’s my new Lamborghini.

Jacques van Wyk

Absolutely, there’s a listed IT company that’s been in the news for many reasons, but the joke was that at some stage the sales people were driving more expensive cars than the top executives. Then you think that somewhere there should have been a red flag and now everybody says how did this happen. Social media, big data, gives us a lot of information and because of technology you can collate that information. Like I said earlier, you can do pattern analysis, you can do predictive, so technology does allow us to digest and process a lot of information, it becomes a handy tool. Once again, it’s not the only thing that we look at and use but it assists us greatly in being more effective and more focused in our investigations.

Ciaran Ryan

At what level would you say fraud is most commonly happening, is it senior levels of the organisation or lower down? We know that those in charge of purchasing or tenders are placed under a microscope these days but that wasn’t the case in the past because of the potential for corruption. What’s your take on this?

Jacques van Wyk

Lower levels, smaller amounts and higher frequency. Higher levels, bigger amounts, more planned and normally a lot more planning in concealing the deed because I know I’m going to do this, so I put blind trust in position, I have proxies in place. There are also usually more people involved. But at the lower levels, if those go undetected for a very long time, 18 months, two, three or four years, in terms of value-wise it tends to then equal what you find at top levels.

Ciaran Ryan

We’ve had a few people on the podcast talking about ethics and you’ve mentioned already that we feel it’s okay these days to break a read traffic light but I guess the acid test, it was one lady we had on here, the acid test is when you do something would you be happy to tell your children, would you be proud to tell your children what you did. I just feel that that’s slipped a little bit in South Africa.

Jacques van Wyk

Absolutely, I think because of what we see around us we justify it. It saves me two seconds to not stop dead at the stop street or the traffic light, nobody got hurt. I think that has become the test, nobody got hurt, fraud is a victimless crime. Whereas if I assault you or I kill you, there are consequences. So you are right, that moral line has shifted so far that we have to bring it back. It’s not okay because if you can break one law, why can’t you break another law. There’s no big law or small law and that comes down to the rationalisation. So I fully agree, we need to start with ourselves, what am I doing and if I break the law then I need to have a conversation with myself. You can’t justify your actions against others and that’s what we are doing, but that politician, that businessperson. I need to be held accountable and answer to myself and to society about my actions. But it’s just become easy to say look at the top. We need to look back at ourselves because it starts with one person, me.

Identifying red flags

Ciaran Ryan

I saw a slide, in fact, just a couple of days ago, which I pulled out because I knew you were going to come on here, and it was really looking at this whole area of fraud and what would be typical red flags. So the one thing would be a guy living beyond his means, on Facebook he’s posting pictures of the Lamborghini that he’s just bought on the weekend. But there are other interesting risk categories as well, women going through divorce, the husband runs off with a new woman and he doesn’t pay his maintenance, that could be a scenario that would come up there. What kind of other red flags would you be looking for?

Jacques van Wyk

You are right, lifestyle, that is definitely a big red flag. Secondly, like you pointed out, divorce or a sickness. We find that suddenly a person’s medical aid doesn’t cover or they don’t have medical aid. Also, once again, when people don’t take leave, they have to be in control because they get the figures to balance. Today it’s so easy with the software out there to forge bank statements, to forge signatures on documents and those types of things. Also, complex transactions, when people start telling you, but only I understand what happened with this client or this transaction, you can’t understand this. So immediately people say, well, then I leave it in your good hands. So when the defense or the explanation is that only a specific person or certain persons can deal with it. Then, typically, you get those dictators in organisations who say don’t look further. So by personality and instruction if people by virtue of their position block certain investigations or reviews or a deeper look into things, that is definitely a big, big red flag at the end of the day.

Ciaran Ryan

It’s interesting that you mention that because the German fellow that I worked with, who I told you about earlier, that was the first thing he would do when he went into a company, he would look for that individual where if you needed paper clips or postage stamps, you would have to go to this one character because he said that often you would find that this character would hoard certain duties and functions to himself. But it would progress from there to him saying I am the only person who understands or who knows how to deal with a particular character at the bank, and my friend’s policy was – I don’t think you can do it today – but his policy was to fire that person straight away.

Jacques van Wyk

It’s interesting, once again, power by association. So I understand the boss, I can manage the boss, I understand their needs. So, quite correctly, I love that. But, once again, you speak from experience and it’s real, it’s not just theory, it’s real out there.

Ciaran Ryan

We are running out of time here but in very general terms, how can one put systems in place in an organisation to prevent fraud?

Jacques van Wyk

I think, one, it’s education, two is the continual review of your policies and your procedures and your controls because systems are becoming more complex, technology allows people a greater ability to do things and circumvent. Then, as I said earlier, be proactive, rather get organisations, like us, to do a risk review for you. Fresh eyes, we are not part of the organisation, its culture, its politics and we see things because we are not part of the organisation. So having that fresh independent view also can highlight things. Also, people doing risk assessments in an organisation have access to tools and information that allows them to do searches, have a look at certain things and they are able to quickly respond and point things out to you. I say again, prevention is cheaper than cure and, therefore, move away from reactive to being a lot more proactive. But the fact that you reviewed your policies two years ago or five years ago, you are in serious trouble, it should be part of your annual processes. Let’s look at these things and all controls and policies should be cost effective, you’re not going to spend R1000 to police R1. So it’s a better understanding of the organisation, be proactive, when something happens, when there is an incident hold people accountable for it, so that people in the organisation see that there are consequences. When people know there are no consequences or limited consequences that’s when they feel more comfortable and brazen to take the next step. So I am going to take R20 because the company’s tolerance level is at R1000, so I can grow my monthly drawing or weekly drawing or daily drawing up to R990 because the internal audit or external auditors are going to look at R1000 plus. So it’s those small things but be proactive, be interested in your organisation. Small things are sometimes red flags but we write them off as once-off anomalies or a once-off incident. Look at those things because normally they are indicative of bigger things that’s being hidden under the water. In operations we talk about the iceberg, lower the water level so that you can see the true iceberg and not just the tip. The tip is just the tip, we want to see the mountain underneath that’s being hidden by the water.

Ciaran Ryan

Give me a practical example of what you’re talking about there, the smaller things that when you start pulling the string would reveal a Sherman tank.

Jacques van Wyk

You’re having lunch with a client and the client says to you that he doesn’t understand this, they got their debtor statement and he knew for a fact that they paid us last week, it was R10 000 but when he got the statement the payment didn’t show. So you go in and speak to the person in charge of the account and they say, what happened was I just incorrectly allocated it, or you pick up that somebody has flown on the company account and you go to the person to ask why and they say, I meant to ask permission, I need to urgently fly my family down to Cape Town, you weren’t in the office but in the past you have okayed it, I’ve repaid the company, so I thought it was okay, I’m terribly sorry, forgive me. So it’s those little incidences that come through or you find that your security at the gate let an order go through that wasn’t authorised to a client that’s in arrears and the person at the gate says sorry, I tried to get someone in accounts and they said it was okay. Then you find out that the security has been paid off. So it’s those little once-off small incidents, which appear insignificant, but if you dig, have a look at it. If there’s nothing, then you can say, well, glad we had a look at it but a lot of times there’s a lot more to it than meets the eye.

Ciaran Ryan

Here’s a final question I ask everybody who comes on the podcast, have you got any good books that you’d recommend?

Jacques van Wyk

Gangster State by Pieter-Louis Myburgh.

Ciaran Ryan

Yes, I have read that.

Jacques van Wyk

The Free State is my home province, if you speak to anybody…

Ciaran Ryan

For those people who don’t know, Gangster State is a book about Ace Magashule, who was the Premier or what you might call the Governor of the Free State and it details some very, very strange and corrupt practices in that province.

Jacques van Wyk

Yes, he’s currently part of the top six, it’s a very powerful position that he holds. In our industry, like any other industry, there’s always a whisper and I heard this, are you aware of that and when I read the book there were a lot of things that I was aware of or I had heard about. But, I must say, the writer brought it together so nicely. What stood out to me was the sheer value of the transactions that were lost. If you look at the Free State Health Department, they don’t have money. If you look at infrastructure…

Ciaran Ryan

It percolates down because some of the most corrupt, badly managed municipalities are found in the Free State. For example, Ficksburg.

Jacques van Wyk

Absolutely, Welkom, they always feature somewhere, in the top ten or top five. Look at debt to Eskom. You look and you say but we have the Public Finance Management Act, we have the Systems Act, we have the Constitution, and then you talk to these government officials and they say but I was threatened, people were killed, I was scared of my job, I have a small family to take care of, so when I was instructed to do this or it was alluded that the person on the hill gave the instruction, they did these things. They said that they acknowledge that these things were done. Yesterday I was at a presentation from the Director General at National Treasury for Specialised Audit Services and one of the questions from people was how do we create a safer environment for people to whistle-blow because South Africa has got a very bad track record of crucifying the whistle-blower. We are going to punish you for daring to wash our dirty laundry. She made a very interesting comment, she said when we do our investigations, when we write our reports, we should say that we received the following information, this was provided to us but leave people’s names out of it, so that they are not targeted because we need to turnaround that state of fear that exists within government. There are good civil servants out there who really want to make a difference. I took that comment to heart, that we as forensic investigators and people writing reports, we can also do our bit to create that safe space within the environment. Yes, I know whistleblowing has been abused in the past, where people try to settle scores and attack people’s image but it’s that 80/20 principle, you can’t take away the 80% of good because there was 20% of abuse. But we need to create a safe space for people to put up their hands and talk. So all of these commissions that we have at the moment, we are hearing these things. I think it’s a good start, where people are telling stories and providing information. There’s a lot to be done after these commissions and I hope that we’ll also see that action being taken. You hear murmurs in the street about SARS saying that even the proceeds of crime is income and you should declare that. That’s how Al Capone, they didn’t charge him for murder or racketeering or all these things, they got him on his tax. So SARS Commissioner Edward Kieswetter has got his work cut out for him. Let’s hope that we’re at a turning point and that we’re going to find our moral compass again, and that we do the right thing for the right reasons and not just ticking the boxes.

Ciaran Ryan

Jacques, thank you so much for coming in, that was fascinating. That was Jacques van Wyk, certified fraud examiner and managing director of JGL Forensic Services.