New home affairs minister prepared to revoke Gupta citizenship

In an interview with City Press, Home Affairs Minister Hlengiwe Mkhize said she would revoke the Gupta family’s citizenship should it be proved it was incorrectly awarded to them.

Her predecessor, Malusi Gigaba, stands accused of fast-tracking their naturalisation application wrongfully shortly after he became the minister. He has denied having done anything wrong, saying the family had been incorrectly rejected for naturalisation and he had merely overturned that decision.

Mkhize defended Gigaba’s decision in 2015 as lawful this week, but told City Press she would not make any pronouncement on what might happen until all the state capture allegations have been subjected to proper scrutiny.

“Everybody is innocent until proven guilty.”

She added, however, that her department had not found anything untoward about Gigaba’s decision, although there had been an oversight on Gigaba’s part in that he failed to table the names of the family members in parliament.

Although this technically means he broke the law, Mkhize feels this can be corrected by tabling the names of the affected family members now.