Ramaphosa must save his integrity and resign: Lungisa on Phala Phala report

ANC treasurer hopeful Andile Lungisa has slammed President Cyril Ramaphosa’s defenders and called for him to resign.

“It's better for the president to protect his family and save his integrity by resigning,” he told TimesLIVE.

This after the section 89 panel investigating the Phala Phala matter found Ramaphosa may have committed a serious violation of the law and serious misconduct in terms of the constitution.

Ramaphosa’s lieutenants have been reported to claim that there is no basis to the calls for him to resign or step aside, citing that the report says he “may have a case to answer” and not that he is guilty.

In response, Lungisa said: “I think they drink qhilika [a home-brewed liquor], unless they have not read the report. I read the report and people who have read the report will not say what they are saying.” 

Lungisa said there would be no leadership crisis upon Ramaphosa’s resignation.

“If the president steps down or resigns, there is a deputy president who will assume the position. I don’t think there is a crisis of leadership in the ANC. There’s a hierarchy, we have a deputy president in the country that will assist.”

Lungisa said the report was clear on the allegations. “The report is saying there is no evidence of how this money has come into the republic. The report says that the exact amount of this foreign currency stolen is yet to be disclosed.

“The report says that the investigation by the Reserve Bank suggests strongly that it has no records of this money entering this country. The report says the particulars, the address of this individual called Hazim is not known. The report says this man bought 20 buffalo but he has not collected them for over two-and-a-half years.

“The report says the money was not kept in a safe, suggesting that it would be deposited at the bank. Instead, the report says that the money was hidden under a sofa. How can money in the residence of a president be kept under a sofa?

“This is what the report is saying — unless now they are smoking whoonga and they’ve decided not to read the report,.”

He accused Ramaphosa’s supporters of having no interest in the ANC and for “mutating like snakes from one president to the other”.

“In fact, the people supporting the president was the same crowd at the forefront of the Nkandla report. All of them have no interest in the ANC — they only have an interest for their stomachs. We are dealing with allies here that have no other business but to steal from the poor.

“The same crowd of individuals fails one president and moves on to fail the next one. When they dump President Cyril, they’ll go and fail the next one. That’s what they do.”

When asked about what to expect from the ANC national executive committee (NEC) meeting, initially scheduled to take place later on Thursday but since postponed until Friday, he said it was “immaterial” for the NEC to sit.

“In fact, serious people cannot pay attention to what the NEC is saying, really. What is material now is that the report says there is prima facie evidence — and what's left is for the [National Prosecuting Authority] to act.”

Lungisa said the NEC was “just a waste of time”.

“It is no longer that NEC of the ANC in the older days, where their meetings were the highest decision-making body and we understood that they would make sound, coherent decisions.

“Since the last conference, I don’t think there’s any South African who really applies what the NEC says or will not say. I really don’t pay attention to what the NEC says or does not say. The NEC does not follow the constitution of the ANC and it's what the upcoming conference must be able to address.

“We need an NEC that, when they meet, the country comes to a standstill. If they know that the NEC will take a sober, proper, well-thought decision that is in the interests of the republic. It has not happened for the past four to five years. I cannot expect that it must happen now.”

Lungisa has made it known that he is available for the position of treasurer ahead of the party's 55th national conference in December.

TimesLIVE

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