Phosa reiterates call for Zuma to do ‘honourable thing' and step down - warns country’s democracy is under threat

ANC stalwart Mathews Phosa has implored the party’s cadres not to allow themselves to be blindly loyal and instead support him in his call for President Jacob Zuma to step down.

“Do not allow yourselves to be deceived by populists and false prophets‚ do not become hopeless and apathetic – If you allow this to happen‚ we will have lost it all‚” he told a Freedom Day celebration in the Langa township in Cape Town on Saturday.

If Zuma was truly committed to South Africa and its people‚ Phosa added‚ then he should do the honourable thing and make way for those that want to save the party and the country’s democracy.

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He said the current ANC was but a mere shadow of its former glorious self and that the country’s democracy was under threat a mere 22 years after its attainment.

“The current leadership will do nothing for our people other than that for which they have become reviled – theft‚ corruption‚ external capture and rampant mismanagement.”

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No-one could convince him‚ he said‚ that the current ANC leadership represented the ideals and aspirations for which many had fought and died.

“This is a new‚ unscrupulous breed of politicians who serve the self and not the people‚ and who seem to have lost all sense of decency and honour – let alone commitment to Ubuntu.” . Under the current dispensation‚ the Bill of Rights and the other provisions of the Constitution were routinely trampled on‚ disregarded and disrespected – by no less than the President himself. Human freedoms‚ dignity‚ inclusivity and the rule of law in the current South Africa were a mockery.

“Only our courts‚ and particularly our Supreme Courts‚ Supreme Court of Appeals and the Constitutional Court continue to offer a valiant defence of our embattled democracy and we the citizens cling desperately to that last avenue of redress.

“The ANC leadership‚ supported by a fake-news propagandist campaign‚ conceived implemented and funded by the Gupta family‚ is hell-bent on dividing rather than unifying our country; on excluding rather than including; and of vilifying its own citizens in pursuit of an agenda that is completely self-serving and hugely destructive‚” Phosa charged.

He added that in the last few weeks‚ in the face of massive public expressions of anger‚ disgust and concern at the state of affairs in the country‚ the ruling party had responded by blaming everyone else.

“… they blame white monopoly capital‚ racism‚ tribalism‚ other minorities‚ xenophobia and subversive malcontents. These factors have all been trotted out in an attempt to deflect attention away from the harsh reality of a deeply divided ANC‚ the gross mismanagement of the public purse‚ and plunder of our country and a failed leadership. I find this deeply‚ deeply disturbing.

“Comrades‚ if no-one has said it plainly‚ let me say it to you plainly today so that you cannot say‚ ‘…but we did not know’: Our democracy is under direct threat. And if we do not do something about it we will be a very short step away from dictatorship‚” Phosa warned. “We have to rebuild our party and our government and ensure that we have ethical governance and leaders of integrity. Men and women who will serve every single citizen of this country and not just their families and friends‚ or their cultural or religious group.

“The time has come for us to take back our beloved ANC‚ elect a leadership that we can once again respect and trust to re build our country for the benefit of all South Africans‚” Phosa added.