On Friday afternoon President Cyril Ramaphosa ran into Jacob Zuma outside the hall where the plenary session of the ANC’s national conference was about to start. Ramaphosa reached out and shook Zuma’s hand, cracked a joke, laughed genially with his predecessor and headed into the centre. Why was Ramaphosa still making nice with a man who has over the past five years waged war with him?
The night before, Zuma had stuck yet another long and potentially deadly knife into Ramaphosa’s back. In a move aimed at stopping Ramaphosa from being eligible for re-election to the presidency of the ANC, Zuma had initiated a private prosecution of Ramaphosa. In Zuma and his supporters’ simplistic terms, the private prosecution put Ramaphosa in the crosshairs of his own rule that ANC leaders and members charged with a crime should step down from their positions.
Ramaphosa has been summoned to appear in court on January 19 to face a charge of being an “accessory after the fact” in the private prosecution Zuma is pursuing against NPA prosecutor Billy Downer and journalist Karyn Maughan for allegedly disclosing a document concerning Zuma’s medical condition. We all know the charges against Downer and Maughan are nonsensical, just as this latest Zuma charge against Ramaphosa is the usual Stalingrad tactic tripe.
Like his many attempts this year to unseat Ramaphosa, Zuma’s gambit failed. ANC electoral committee secretary Livhuwani Matsila told TimesLIVE Premium on Saturday that the actions against Ramaphosa did not amount to “criminal charges in the court of law”. On Saturday evening Ramaphosa faced off against Zweli Mkhize for the ANC presidency. Zuma’s preferred candidate, his ex-wife Nkosazana Zuma-Dlamini, had so little support she declined nomination.
The point, is that with these charges, after the failure of the Phala Phala campaign (it was triggered by Zuma’s former spy boss) and the numerous attempts within the ANC NEC to force Ramaphosa out, Zuma was not giving up on his all-out war against Ramaphosa. He aims to fight to the bitter end. Just a few hours after Ramaphosa greeted him jovially, Zuma disrupted Ramaphosa’s delivery of his political report by walking in late, smirking while his supporters sang and ululated.
The problem is that his (Ramapahosa’s) failure to deal decisively with the crooks in his party — by calling them out explicitly — he is not just putting the ANC in danger. He is putting SA in danger by emboldening them.
This has been the trend for years. Yet, Ramaphosa keeps smiling, keeps begging for unity and reconciliation, keeps trying to embrace the corrupt elements within his party. The problem is that his failure to deal decisively with the crooks in his party — by calling them out explicitly — he is not just putting the ANC in danger. He is putting SA in danger by emboldening them. We saw this with the acts of Zuma’s supporters and children as they applauded and encouraged the July 2021 riots.
If Ramaphosa is elected to lead the ANC again at this conference, he should listen to people around him. They are not wearing rose-tinted glasses, as he is. Vincent Magwenya, Ramaphosa’s spokesperson, read the situation and called it in a tweet on Friday: “We are well beyond the realms of political contestation. We are now facing an all out (sic) war that is inspired by deep-seated personal hatred seeking to burn everything and anything on it’s path (sic). Even the country will not be spared from the wrath of such hatred.”
It is not the first time concerns arise about Zuma posing a threat to the stability of the country. In March last year, ANC thought leader Joel Netshitenzhe wrote a piece that foresaw the July riots that took place just three months later. At the time, he warned that “it cannot be ruled out that SA’s own Savimbis and Dhlakamas — who destabilised Angola and Mozambique with the support of the erstwhile SA Defence Force and its military intelligence — are crawling out of the woodwork and showing their true colours”.
He told South Africans bluntly: “Lest we forget: the beneficiaries of corruption and state capture will not give up without a fight. SA cannot afford to be complacent!”
The only person who seems oblivious to this danger is Ramaphosa. He continues to smile and joke with Zuma. He never criticises Zuma or his supporters. They, in the meantime, play Russian roulette with the country by bringing spurious charges against him as they did on Friday.
The nation is tired of these antics. The country is enduring its worst load-shedding in years. The president of the country should be dealing with these real and urgent crises. Instead, he is busy making nice with a man found to be the architect of state capture by the Zondo commission. At some point Ramaphosa’s obsession with the unity of the ANC needs to come to an end, and he needs to govern for all South Africans — if he wins, of course. That means explicitly condemning the likes of Jacob Zuma. Otherwise he does not deserve to be president.
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.