Thuli's legacy a 'gift' that keeps giving

18 September 2016 - 02:00 By Peter Bruce
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This just has to be deliberate. Thuli Madonsela, the public protector, has just 10 working days left in her job. Her term has expired and she is being replaced by Busisiwe Mkhwebane, until recently an analyst with the State Security Agency.

Mkhwebane's appointment was not without controversy. The DA voted against her appointment because, it said, it had information that she had been a spy when she worked as an immigration official in our embassy in China.

I still don't know what to make of that. How does a South African diplomat in China spy on China? What could we possibly want to know that they wouldn't just tell us? I don't think it's important really.What's important is whether she is really up to one of the toughest jobs in South African public life.

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We all wish her well, of course, but Madonsela has done both Mkhwebane and the rest of us a huge favour by ensuring that the biggest scandal of our democracy - the looting of public resources and the capture of large parts of the state by President Jacob Zuma's business cronies, the Gupta family - will be the first item the new public protector will have to deal with when she starts on October 3.

She's done that by instigating an investigation into state capture in the dying months of her term and, now, by announcing she'll publish it before she leaves.

Seeing as we all now know that the public protector's findings have the force of law, whatever Madonsela "finds" or "recommends" in her Gupta report will have to be done whether she is in office or not. It will not be pretty.

She will, for instance, have spoken to Deputy Finance Minister Mcebisi Jonas about the meeting with the Guptas last year when they offered him the job of finance minister. Jonas's word is prima facie evidence enough that a corrupt act took place and which should be prosecuted.

I reckon she will order it done.

Madonsela has also subpoenaed piles of financial information from the entire cabinet, an order with which they are obliged to comply, in order for her staff to be able to extend the investigation further after she has gone and in case her replacement doesn't quite have the cojones to be so cheeky.

Mkhwebane has been a bit oversold. She is a "brilliant legal mind", we're told, and while that may be true its bearing on leading the office of the public protector is questionable. To do that you need first and foremost to be a leader.

block_quotes_start Madonsela's little welcome gift, the Gupta investigation, will be neatly wrapped and waiting for the new public protector block_quotes_end

I have not studied Mkhwebane's career in detail but she is clearly short of leadership experience. She had led no investigations or teams when she worked in the public protector's office before and her other jobs in government have been relatively junior.

Now she is elevated to the equivalent of a judge, or a judge president even, with a big and experienced team going off in all directions chasing down bad guys.

For many people, a first instinct would be to stop everything and take stock. That would be wrong. The staff members Madonsela leaves behind are anxious and fearful. Some of them will remember mentoring young Busisiwe when she was first there.

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She should try to hit the ground running, make her people feel appreciated and show that the heat on corrupt politicians and officials is going to be turned up and not down.

Madonsela's little welcome gift, the Gupta investigation, will be neatly wrapped and waiting for the new public protector. It will represent the best possible chance for the best possible start for Mkhwebane.

She will need all the help she can get. The next few years, the last of the Zuma era, could be very ugly. Does he fight or flee?

Either way, he's cornered and the only politicians who honestly want him to stay in his job are Mmusi Maimane and Julius Malema. Trying to rescue the ANC with Zuma still at the helm or pulling some puppet successor's strings will see the party lose its majority in 2019 to their parties.

Thanks to Madonsela, Mkhwebane's character is going to be tested immediately and that's good, because we need to quickly know where we stand. It is in the big ANC succession battle to come that laws and citizens' rights will be trampled upon and that is when we are going to need a public protector with courage and integrity.

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