CAIPHUS KGOSANA | I’m still in the dark as to the reasons behind cabinet reshuffle appointments

So, the cabinet reshuffle finally happened.

I was load-shedding when President Cyril Ramaphosa finally stepped on the podium to announce the worst-kept secret, confirming widely reported speculation that he had chosen head of infrastructure in his office — Kgosientsho Ramokgopa — to become our first electricity minister. By the time they swore him and other new ministers and deputies in, I was load-shedding again.

Ramokgopa is a highly-effective technocrat with a file of impressive academic qualifications. But make no mistake, he’s been given a hospital pass here. No matter what diplomatic spin they try on the creation of this ministry, he’s going to step on the toes of colleagues.

Gwede Mantashe might put on a brave face, but ANC delegates were unequivocal about moving Eskom to his energy ministry. They said nothing about creating another ministry, which will in all likelihood be in charge of Eskom.

Two new ministries have been added to an already bloated cabinet. Ramaphosa was at pains to explain how this is temporary, and through work being undertaken by the National Treasury the size of cabinet will shrink when the new administration takes office next year.

Cue rolling eyes.

You don’t solve a problem of an inefficient executive by creating more layers of it. You slash it down, especially when it is so heavy on the public purse.

The Sunday Times reported how Ramaphosa’s 62 ministers and their deputies cost the taxpayers R2bn over five years, with 624 officials employed as “support staff” in ministerial offices.

This was a day before a reshuffle that added two more ministries.

These figures are from responses to parliamentary questions posed by the DA to 27 ministers. Ministerial support staff appointments are guided by the 2019 ministerial handbook. It limits them to 11 per minister and seven per deputy minister. But 12 out of the 27 ministers are in breach of the handbook, with some employing up to 17 people in their private offices.

I understand some ministers have taken issue with the story, moaning that it paints them as spendthrifts who don’t respect public funds. One or two argue they found some of the staff members already employed when they took office and can’t just dismiss them mid-contract.

You see, the problem with this mysterious handbook is it lives somewhere between the presidency and the department of public service and administration, but no-one bothers to properly explain it to the public. This is the tragedy of a dearth of government communications.

What’s supposed to be the propaganda arm — Government Communications and Information System (GCIS) — is dead. It has had no head since Phumla Williams retired, and almost all its top executives are acting.

Cabinet statements used to be packed with rich information on the workings of government. Nowadays they read like church notices: cabinet welcomes, cabinet congratulates, cabinet condemns, cabinet notes.

Occasionally ministers are dragged to press conferences where they read long statements and take questions from journalists in clusters of five or ten, often forgetting to answer or sidestepping tough questions which get lost in translation. But that is a column for another day.

The presidency is lucky to have Vincent Magwenya, a seasoned communications professional, as spokesperson. But when you are responsible for communicating for an office whose leader genuinely at times seems disinterested in the job, you’ll always have your back against the wall. On Sunday he tried hard to spin that embarrassing moment when Ramaphosa, supposedly bedridden with a cold, hosted an Ankole stokvel at Phala Phala. 

When this same president tells us he’s adding two more ministers, temporarily, while waiting for the conclusion of a rationalisation process that will trim cabinet, we take it with heaps of salt. It also sends the wrong message to consolidate power in his private office by increasing its size, when the message to the rest of government is belt-tightening. How does he expect those civil servants out on the streets protesting for higher wages to feel when they see him fattening up his own office?

As someone pointed out, the bells and whistles for new ministers and unnecessary deputies will add millions more to the wage bill.

The constitution gives Ramaphosa the prerogative to choose his own executive. He can reduce its size tomorrow if he chooses. But he won’t because ANC tradition means you have to over-consult all these provinces and alliance structures who want their people in the cabinet to validate their “hegemony” over the state, or whatever rubbish jargon they use.

Thuma mina! (send me), Ramaphosa implored us in his first state of the nation address. If we knew sending him was going to be this costly we would have tried another way.