SAICA responds to media allegations and reaffirms commitment to governance and fair process
Johannesburg, 23 September 2025 - The South African Institute of Chartered Accountants rejects the allegations contained in the Daily Maverick 168 article published on 19 September 2025, titled "SAICA house of cards shaken by whistle-blower findings".
SAICA is advised that the article was published in breach of the Press Code, as the Daily Maverick wrote to seek SAICA’s response on 18 September, and SAICA confirmed that it would provide feedback by 19 September 2025. The Daily Maverick did not object, nor did they confirm if this would be suitable and did not wait for SAICA to respond by the very next day, as the institute had indicated it would. This rush to publish the version of its single source, Mr Jaco Snyman, without affording the institute a meaningful right of reply, has unfortunately resulted in patent errors in the publication, and an entirely one-sided adoption of his views.
Mr Snyman, in his role as Executive Director for Governance, was not just the Company Secretary but also oversaw the company secretariat, commercial, and legal and member discipline. He is currently facing disciplinary action by SAICA (his hearing was to be heard the day the article was published but has been postponed due to his reported illness). The serious charges that Mr Snyman faces will be adjudicated on by an external chairperson, and SAICA will not comment on the merits of the charges.
However, SAICA refutes the narrative that it is seeking to punish Mr Snyman for 'whistleblowing’. Through this press statement, SAICA wishes to emphasise critical facts that are missing from the Daily Maverick article.
SAICA can confirm that Mr. Snyman is currently on precautionary suspension pending the finalisation of a disciplinary enquiry into serious allegations of misconduct. Mr. Snyman was suspended 17 March 2025 and not 18 March 2025 and alleged. Mr. Snyman's disciplinary enquiry is an internal matter and consequently SAICA cannot comment on the merits as the matter is still ongoing. SAICA will issue a statement in due course once the disciplinary enquiry has been finalised. SAICA can also confirm that Mr Snyman has referred numerus disputes to relevant dispute resolution tribunals. SAICA respects Mr Snyman's rights and will respond at the appropriate time and before appropriate fora. During Mr Snyman’s suspension he has access to his laptop, information and employees through his Human Capital Business Partner.
There is no evidence to substantiate Mr Snyman’s allegations as contained in the article. SAICA can confirm that Mr. Snyman was not the subject of occupational detriment, “calculated abuse” and/or “retaliation”. SAICA expressly denies that Mr Snyman was suspended for “raising red flags”, as the disciplinary action was initiated prior to any whistleblower reports being made. The external independent chairperson of the disciplinary enquiry rejected Mr Snyman's argument that his hearing should not go ahead because he was subjected to an occupational detriment.
SAICA recognises the importance of the SAICA Group Whistleblowing Procedure and the Protected Disclosure Act (PDA) in safeguarding employees who report misconduct in good faith. “We affirm that any report made in substantial compliance with the prescribed procedure is treated with the requisite seriousness, and the organisation is committed to protecting whistleblowers from occupational detriment”, said Patricia Stock, SAICA CEO.
Whistleblower reports are processed in accordance with SAICA’s Whistleblower Procedure and the PDA. SAICA protects whistleblowers making protected disclosures in good faith. Whistleblowers identities are kept anonymous to prevent occupational detriment unless they advise otherwise or disclose their identities voluntarily.
However, the existence of a Protected Disclosure does not provide blanket immunity from all disciplinary action, particularly where subsequent or unrelated misconduct is identified. The procedure prohibits disciplinary action “on account, or partly on account” of a Protected Disclosure, but it does not preclude legitimate disciplinary measures for conduct that stands independently of the disclosure or for conduct that breaches other organisational policies or codes of conduct. Each matter must be evaluated on its merits, considering the causal nexus between the disclosure and the disciplinary action.
SAICA denies having received any reports during March 2024, more specifically 25 March 2024. On 24 March 2025 SAICA was notified of a report submitted to the Anonymous Tip-Offs Hotline 19 March 2025 which implicated the Board of SAICA, the Board Chairman and CEO as the anonymous tip-off hotline escalation structure does not provide for an escalation past the Board Chairman. The concerns raised by the reporter included that a higher than usual number of SAICA Board and Board sub-committee meetings were held during 2024 when compared to “the market”, which results in financial benefit for respective members through increased sitting fees, that the concerns regarding the frequency of meetings had previously been raised with the Board Chairperson, Chief Executive Officer and Executive Committee without any action being taken, and that intimidation and abuse of power by board members.
A leading law firm, namely Bowmans Gilfillan Inc. (Bowmans), was appointed to independently investigate the allegations that are the subject of the Daily Maverick 168 article. The National Council of SAICA constituted a Council Independent Investigation Committee (CIIC) comprising Independent National Council and SAICA members with relevant expertise to oversee the investigation and evaluate the findings from Bowmans.
Bowmans issued its final report on 26 May 2025, which indicated that it did not find any substantiating evidence to back up the reporter’s allegations. Bowmans concluded and reported that:
- no prima facie evidence was found that the meetings were unwarranted;
- no willful intent by any Board member to mislead or defraud SAICA in respect of sitting fees was identified;
- the increased number of Board and sub‑committee meetings was attributable to a range of organisational matters that necessitated more meetings than originally scheduled;
- no evidence that the matter had been formally raised with the CEO or the Board Chairperson; and
- no evidence of undue influence or intimidation by the SAICA Board.
Bowmans did however find that there were some control weaknesses and made recommendations to address these. SAICA always values constructive feedback, and as such, is implementing tighter governance controls in relation to the payment of directors' fees following recommendations made by Bowmans.
As per the Whistleblowing Process the reporter’s identity was kept anonymous and confidential. The CEO, Board Chairman, Board and the CIAC members as a result had no knowledge of the reporter’s identity as the reports received were handled in a strictly confidential manner. SAICA continued to apply the principles adopted in the Whistleblowing Process and the reporter’s identity was kept anonymous.
To conclude on this issue: SAICA strongly refutes the narrative that Mr Snyman is being punished for whistleblowing. SAICA respects and values whistleblowers and takes all such reports very seriously. The dissemination of disinformation about the organisation while a disciplinary process is ongoing is in SAICA's view concerning. The independent chair is seized with determining the guilt or otherwise of the charges against Mr Snyman, and this process should be allowed to run its course.
Confidential information and false and misleading reports
SAICA is also concerned that confidential reports have been disclosed by Mr Snyman to Daily Maverick and quoted out of context and ignores that the NED benchmark analysis was commissioned by the Board and PWC conducted the analysis against two reference points, namely a fee-build up analysis and a comparator group benchmarking analysis. The fee-build is PWC’s primary reference point with the comparator group benchmarking being our second reference point. Notably PWC concluded that, “The build up fee per meeting analysis shows that the Board Chair and Board Member are well below the market while the LID and the sub-committee chairs are slightly below the market. The compa-ratios of the Board Chair and Board Member fees are below the tolerance band as the market hourly fees for these roles are higher than the AGSA fee used for these roles by SAICA. The other roles are all within the tolerance band. The sub-committee chairs and members are very well aligned with the market, indicating that the AGSA fees used by SAICA aligns well to the discounted professional fees (30% discount for sub-committee chairs and 50% for sub-committee members) used by PwC”.
Mr Snyman and Daily Maverick falsely report that the PwC NED benchmark report confirm that SAICA’s per-meeting fee structure is rare among professional bodies. None of the comparator group entities are professional bodies, but in fact listed companies. They further falsely state that the per-meeting fee structure makes it particularly vulnerable for abuse as the report does not state or imply same. They further misleadingly only highlight 2 of the 12 companies (17%) of the comparator group to serve their narrative and the report nowhere states that this ‘Retainer’ fees are the most used fee to prevent exploitation.
The reviewed annual fees for Board remuneration were considered and approved by SAICA members during the 28 May 2025 Annual General Meeting.
The article also selectively quoted from the Institute of Directors of South Africa (IoDSA) report. For instance, the IoDSA’s report did not paint a "damning" picture of dysfunction – the overall performance score for the board was 3.9 out of 5, which is rated "good". There is certainly room for improvement, but this is hardly a basis to support the claims in the Daily Maverick article.
The entire tenor of the article, that SAICA executives are abusing member funds through their fees, is completely unsupported by any of the information provided to Daily Maverick. Even the heading is wildly inaccurate – the whistleblower made no "findings" against SAICA; he made allegations, which were found to be unsubstantiated.
Member Disciplinary process
One of the themes of the Daily Maverick article is that SAICA lacks competence to conduct investigations and prosecutions. This is a malicious narrative.
The lack of insight into the SAICA disciplinary processes and cases is surprising in light of Mr Snyman’s previous oversight role of the disciplinary function.
Despite the obvious challenges which SAICA as a professional body experiences in obtaining the evidence necessary to prosecute complaints (as SAICA does not have powers of subpoena, it is often necessary to await the finalisation of parallel regulatory; law enforcement and/or Court processes) SAICA has, over the past years evidenced significantly positive results in the prosecution and finalisation of disciplinary complaints, among them investigation into complaints relating to Transnet and Eskom, which led to the exclusion of Mr. Anoj Singh from membership of SAICA and the cancellation of membership of Mr. Tshifhiwa Matodzi, relating to VBS Mutual Bank allegations.
In relation to the complaint against Mr. Markus Jooste in respect of allegations of misconduct at Steinhoff, SAICA publicly announced when a charge sheet was issued to Mr. Jooste and SAICA spent significant time and resources obtaining both documentary evidence and witnesses to present before a Disciplinary Committee hearing. Despite this, SAICA had to abandon the preparations for this disciplinary hearing due to Mr. Jooste passing on.
In 2024, SAICA finalised 1 287 matters and this included the successful prosecution of the case of Ms. Yakhe Kwinana, relating to SAA, which was referred to SAICA by the Zondo Commission with a referral for SAICA to investigate the matter. It is important to point out that the referral from the Commission does not in itself constitute evidence which could be presented to a Disciplinary Committee hearing. The article incorrectly suggests that the Zondo Commission drove the Kwinana prosecution. This is factually incorrect. Whilst the Zondo Commission made recommendations, SAICA had to independently source expert witnesses and documentary evidence, which required extensive time and resources. The suggestion that external investigators "did the heavy lifting" is entirely unfair and misrepresents the substantial work undertaken by SAICA's legal and disciplinary teams.
This matter took SAICA well over a year to investigate and obtain the necessary documentary evidence and witnesses to successfully prosecute the matter. It was the work undertaken by SAICA and its pro-forma prosecutors which led to the guilty findings and sanctions by the independent Disciplinary Committee, which sanctions included Ms. Kwinana being excluded from membership of SAICA and the imposition of a Fine in the amount of R6.1 million.
Further to this, SAICA also successfully defended the High Court review application launched by Ms. Kwinana to attempt to set aside the Finding of the SAICA Disciplinary Committee.
In relation to the Rigby case, the article's assertion that "the disciplinary process fell apart because SAICA applied the wrong code of conduct" demonstrates a lack of understanding of the case – it is simply not true.
In terms of the statistics provided around trainee accountants, where the article references that "40% of trainee accountants admitting to witnessing phantom ticking in 2021", SAICA has never held such statistics.
As a responsible professional institute, SAICA can only investigate any matter when there is prima facie evidence.
SAICA remains committed to upholding the highest standards of ethical conduct, transparency, and accountability in service of our members and the public interest. In addition, SAICA has robust governance structures in place and has revised its target operating model with the aim continuously strengthen its mechanisms to ensure they serve the profession and public effectively. The disinformation published in the article undermines the institute as well as the profession and SAICA welcomes this opportunity to set the record straight.
Issued by the SAICA Corporate Affairs Team
About SAICA
The South African Institute of Chartered Accountants (SAICA), South Africa’s pre-eminent accountancy body, is recognised as the world’s leading accounting institute and is home to the leading CA designation in the world The Institute provides a wide range of support services to more than 60 000 members and associates who are chartered accountants (CAs[SA]), as well as associate general accountants (AGAs[SA]) and accounting technicians (ATs[SA]), who hold positions as CEOs, MDs, board directors, business owners, chief financial officers, auditors and leaders in every sphere of commerce and industry, and who play a significant role in the nation’s highly dynamic business sector and economic development.
SAICA is a member of Chartered Accountants Worldwide (CAW), a global family that connects over 1,8 million fellow Chartered Accountants and students in more than 190 countries. Together, we support, develop, and promote the role of Chartered Accountants as trusted business leaders, difference makers, and advisers.
SAICA media contact
Kgauhelo Dioka,
***@saica.co.za or 068 087 1867
Manager: Public and media relations
Acting Lead: Corporate Affairs
SAICA Customer Experience Division