Ramaphosa distances himself from dubious Zuma-era appointments
President Cyril Ramaphosa told the Zondo commission on Wednesday that in the Zuma era the ANC’s deployment committee, which he headed for part of that period,
was bypassed regarding a number of dubious appointments at state-owned enterprises, including those of Brian Molefe and Anoj Singh at Eskom and Transnet
In his first appearance before the commission, Ramaphosa put this down to “massive systems failure” and responded in similar vein to other questions on glaring breaches of government policy and ANC guidelines.
“Certain people were put in certain positions to advance certain agendas as you are investigating now on the capture of some of those entities,” he said. “Some of it was so hidden, so masked, that you just could not see that a certain individual [who] was there was [part of] a particular agenda.”
Ramaphosa admits to ‘massive system failure’ in the appointment of SOE boards Ferial Haffajee
The parlous condition of state-owned enterprises was the result of a massive system failure in how the boards of SOEs were appointed, President Cyril Ramaphosa has admitted at the Commission of Inquiry into State Capture.
Ramaphosa completed his first day of testimony before the commission on Wednesday 28 April and will continue for a second day on Thursday. Judge Raymond Zondo asked the head of state what criteria were followed in appointing boards and “how come they (SOEs) are in this state now?”
“Some of the (failure) may have been inadvertent, and some may have been purposeful,” said Ramaphosa.
Particularly for concerned South Africans who had expected him to be put through the wringer in the hopes of finally extracting first-hand answers from someone who was the second in command under former president Jacob Zuma’s tenure that saw billions of rands being syphoned from state entities by the Gupta family and their lieutenants.
The much-anticipated occasion turned out to be nothing more than a cordial affair between Ramaphosa, commission evidence leader Advocate Paul Pretorius and commission chairperson Deputy Chief Justice Raymond Zondo. Support independent journalism Subscribe to News24 for just R75 per month to read all our investigative and in-depth journalism.
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It seems Dintwe’s focus on actually doing his job put a target on his back.
He said “concerted efforts” to remove him from office came within weeks of Bongo being appointed Minister of State Security. Evidence he presented suggests Bongo – who was arrested on charges of corruption in 2019 and later acquitted by controversial Cape Judge President John Hlophe – and his then director-general, Arthur Fraser, launched a twin-pronged attack.
Bongo, according to Dintwe, tried a legislative approach to negate his oversight powers, while Fraser tried to hound him out with unfounded and illogical accusations. He happened to have been investigating a complaint in which Fraser played a central role, filed by DA politician John Steenhuisen.