ANC still has a crucial role to play in SA’s future, says Motsepe

Confederation of African Football (CAF) president and billionaire businessman Patrice Motsepe says the country still needs the ANC — a party he confirmed he was still a member of.

Despite South Africa’s manifold challenges, many of which were said to have been caused by the ANC, the party remained a broad church necessary for the future of the country, he said.

However, Motsepe is still not prepared to enter the ANC’s leadership contest, despite several calls from senior party leaders for him to throw his hat in the ring in the race to be President Cyril Ramaphosa’s successor.

Motsepe was speaking at the South African National Editors’ Forum (Sanef) fundraising gala dinner on Friday, where there was much speculation about whether he would heed the call to take over the reins as ANC president.

Whoever the ANC chooses as [its] president, I will support [that person], and we will work together and make sure … this movement and this broad alliance [is kept] together at all costs — Patrice Motsepe

But Motsepe pointed out that when he was previously asked to enter the leadership race, he had said he was not mad enough to join politics — a view he apparently still holds.

“I don’t have to enter into politics to make [a contribution]. All of us have an enormous obligation [to do so],” he said.

Motsepe stressed that there were people in the ANC who could take over leading the organisation when Ramaphosa completed his term at the party’s 2027 conference.

Currently, the frontrunners to replace Ramaphosa are his deputy, Paul Mashatile, and the party’s secretary-general, Fikile Mbalula.

Though he did not name names, Motsepe said he would support anyone the ANC chose to lead it.

“I can tell you there are some good people in the ANC, excellent people,” he said. “Whoever the ANC chooses as [its] president, I will support, and we will work together and make sure … this movement and this broad alliance [is kept] together at all costs.”

Motsepe said the ANC still had an important role to play in the future of the country, no matter who took over as leader.

He said that, just as it was impossible to develop football without having Kaizer Chiefs at the centre of that process, the ANC also had a pivotal function in South African politics.

“Whether we accept it or not, the African National Congress [is in a formal alliance with] the workers’ organisation Cosatu, [because] the workers must unite. You [also] can’t have an ANC without the [South African] Communist Party.

“So the one thing the older generation got right was to bring everybody [to the table]. [The ANC] was a [broad] church, and it continues to be a [broad] church,” he said.

He acknowledged a lot had gone wrong in the ANC in recent years, but said the baby could not be thrown out with the bathwater just because there were a few bad apples in the party.

“There have been big, big problems with the ANC — enormous. I mean, many of our people are so disappointed, enormously disappointed, [and] with a lot of justification. But I have no doubt in my mind the ANC still has an enormous role to play.

“What I do know as well is that, [as is the case with] policemen, there are some good policemen and there are some rogue policemen. And it’s the policemen that are not so good that give [the others] a bad name.

“So [naturally there are] those people who are a part of these political parties who behave in a manner that is irregular. But, having said that, I’m enormously confident that we will all work together.”

The Motsepe Foundation remains the vehicle he uses to drive change in the country, he said.

“I’ve never liked people who say, ‘We don’t want a president who’s got knock knees.’ Now when I walk around and look at my knees, [I see that] they are knocked all the time, so that rules me out,” he joked.

“I love people who say South Africa does not need a rich man to be president. They are so correct — absolutely correct.”

There have been murmurs that Motsepe would rather contest the Fifa presidency than that of the ANC, but he also sought to dispel that notion.