Overview
- A Reserve Bank affidavit alleges Kastelo, a fintech founded and chaired by DA MP Mark Burke, bypassed South Africa’s exchange control rules to move roughly R4 billion offshore.
- The affidavit says Kastelo used clients’ single discretionary and foreign investment allowances without full consent, opened offshore accounts in clients’ names, and misrepresented compliance to regulators.
- The Reserve Bank has frozen a portion of Kastelo’s accounts held at Access Bank while its broader investigation continues, and the Johannesburg High Court refused Kastelo’s bid to unfreeze the funds.
- Political parties including the ANC and the EFF are demanding Burke’s removal from Parliament’s finance and appropriations committees and calling for ethics probes because he founded and chaired the company while serving on those oversight bodies.
- Next steps include the SARB’s ongoing investigation, possible ethics hearings in Parliament, legal challenges over frozen assets, and scrutiny of any clients whose allowances may have been used without permission.