President Cyril Ramaphosa continues to clean out the institutions that were captured, stolen, undermined, beaten to a pulp and compromised during the Jacob Zuma years. Last week he finally managed to get rid of possibly the most toxic, divisive, incompetent and ethically compromised person in our body politic, Busisiwe Mkhwebane, after her seven wasted years as the public protector.
No-one could have assessed her better than EFF leader Julius Malema, who said, right at the beginning of her tenure in 2017, that supporting her to become South Africa’s public protector was a terrible mistake on his part.
“We just took a puppet from Gupta’s kitchen and said, let’s give her a chance,” he said. “We must stop calling her the public protector and start calling her a state protector.”
From the day of her appointment onwards she did exactly as Malema, the DA, and some ANC MPs, said she would. She became one of the key defenders of the Zuma empire and its many corrupt lieutenants, shielding that train of corruption from thorough investigations, while inexplicably involving intelligence agencies in her work. She was not a public protector or even a “state protector”, but seemingly much worse as the DA (and Malema) had alleged: someone embedded in that office to defend and carry out political hit jobs for Zuma and his cronies.
Many South Africans do not quite grasp just how lucky they are that Mkhwebane has been booted out. History will record that this was one of the most unethical and compromised people to walk into the office of the public protector, someone who sided with the securocrats at the compromised intelligence agencies of the Zuma era and even seemingly took their advice or instruction on what to write in her reports.
Mkhwebane’s departure comes after the comprehensive cleanup of the National Prosecuting Authority early on in Ramaphosa’s tenure, when leaders of the institution who had sat around twiddling their thumbs while corruption flourished were shown the door.
The ANC makes many mistakes, but this past week it made many South Africans proud by taking the courageous step to get rid of the thoroughly discredited Mkhwebane. It is particularly pleasing that the parliamentary vote to boot her out was far higher than the required two-thirds majority. The parliamentary committee set up to probe her, led by the cool and collected Qubudile Dyantyi, was subjected to a torrid disinformation and harassment campaign, but they ploughed on. They are heroes.
Mkhwebane’s departure comes after the comprehensive cleanup of the National Prosecuting Authority early on in Ramaphosa’s tenure, when leaders of the institution who had sat around twiddling their thumbs while corruption flourished were shown the door. Just the other day Berning Ntlemeza, the former Hawks head, popped up at a press conference next to expelled former ANC secretary-general Ace Magashule. Ntlemeza headed the Hawks when it tried to lay trumped-up charges against Pravin Gordhan, who at the time was a fierce critic of Zuma. The Hawks unit, now cleaned up and with the likes of Ntlemeza gone, routinely carries out proper police work on behalf of ordinary South Africans.
There are many others. The intelligence services were used and abused, as mentioned above, for nefarious political purposes such as trying to undermine the SA Reserve Bank. Ramaphosa got rid of Arthur Fraser, the man in charge, by transferring him to correctional services, and letting his contract run out. The SA Revenue Service, another captured entity, has been comprehensively cleaned out after Ramaphosa got rid of the disgraced Tom Moyane and installed Edward Kieswetter.
Ramaphosa’s triumphs in these instances have come through a particularly delightful strategy: he has followed our country’s laws to push the likes of Mkhwebane into a corner, to let them expose themselves in public, and to let institutions like parliament boot them out. He has followed due process. Mkhwebane has said she will challenge her dismissal in court. She must try. She will lose.
That said, in achieving these successes Ramaphosa has contributed to the undermining of some institutions. The SA Reserve Bank is a mighty, independent institution. Its report on the Phala Phala saga is, however, a classic example of good men and women contorting themselves to not reach a conclusion about a truth we can all see: what is the president doing with $580,000 (R11m) hidden in the cushions of his sofa?
The Phala Phala poison has also tainted the incoming public protector even before she takes office as her report on the same matter, Phala Phala, is a case study in obfuscation and misdirection.
Ramaphosa has over the past few weeks been traversing the country reviewing the ANC’s promises, achievements and failures of the past five years. There isn’t much to be proud of, that’s for sure. But he should not hide the fact that when it comes to cleaning out some of the institutions, he has truly tried — and even succeeded — to help us turn our backs on that horrible nine years in which we were misruled and misled by Zuma.
From the SIU to the NPA, public protector, Hawks, Sars and others, a new dawn did come.
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