Business Report writes that Lord Peter Hain, the anti-corruption crusader, on Friday gave his full backing to calls for senior civil servants and politicians to be subjected to annual lifestyle audits as a measure to curb corruption.  

Hain said lifestyle audits could be a useful tool in combating the rampant corruption in South Africa.  “When legislators have declared their interest, lifestyle audits are a useful gauge to check whether they are living within their means or not.  This is a direction South Africa should seriously consider taking to root out corruption,” he said.  Ismail Momoniat, a deputy director-general at the Treasury, last week became the first high-ranking official to publicly call for lifestyle audits in the fight against corruption.  Last year, Naledi Pandor, the Minister of Science and Technology, called on the ANC to conduct lifestyle audits on its members to verify the source of their wealth.  Steven Powell, the head of the forensic services division at Edward Nathan Sonnenbergs, said lifestyle audits were an excellent barometer of the extent of the fraud risk within an organisation.

• Read this report by Kabelo Khumalo in full at Business Report

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