Balance of Power. Qaanitah Hunter
to reshuffle his cabinet by purging his political detractors loomed large at the funeral of the struggle stalwart Ahmed Kathrada, which took place on the Wednesday of the same week in which Gordhan and Jonas were summoned home. Although Zuma was not present at the ceremony, there was a palpable sense of disquiet, anger and indignation aimed at the president. This was given voice when former deputy president Kgalema Motlanthe spoke at the Westpark cemetery and quoted a letter Kathrada had penned to Zuma a year previously, asking him to step down. Gordhan and other ministers like Aaron Motsoaledi listened and applauded while Ramaphosa and former president Thabo Mbeki stood and watched.
When Zuma called the ANC’s top six to his official home that Thursday evening, he put on a stoic face and his tone was measured. He had a list of names in his hand whom he would appoint when he reshuffled his executive but it was not open for discussion, as party leaders had undermined him by leaking what had happened in their meetings with him to the media. Ramaphosa shrugged. So be it, was his attitude. ‘It was just a process of informing us of his decision. It was not a consultation because he came with a ready-made list,’ Ramaphosa said days later.
Mantashe was visibly angered by Zuma’s decision. ‘We were given a list that was complete; and my own view as the secretary-general, I felt like this list has been developed somewhere else and it’s given to us to legitimise it,’ Mantashe said at the time. He, Ramaphosa and Mkhize then huddled together and decided they would publicly distance themselves from the cabinet reshuffle.
In the early hours of the morning, Zuma announced in a statement his new cabinet, which involved twenty changes to the executive, including the dismissal of Pravin Gordhan as finance minister and of his deputy Mcebisi Jonas. Malusi Gigaba replaced Gordhan while Sfiso Buthelezi, the former Passenger Rail Agency (Prasa) chairperson, replaced Jonas. The changes made no sense to anyone. ‘My own view is that I’m very uncomfortable because areas where ministers do not perform have not been touched. Ministers have been moved and the majority of them were good performing ministers. I’m very much uncomfortable with it,’ Mantashe said of the decision.
Party leaders have commented that the March reshuffle as well as the drama that led up to it was indicative of two certainties: that Zuma had perverted the intelligence agencies of the state to serve his interest and that the state was being run from outside the ANC and from outside the Union Buildings.
As civil society increasingly mobilised against Zuma and Ramaphosa stepped up his campaign, the use of the intelligence agencies by Zuma and his allies against their opponents only intensified. Intelligence insiders said that Zuma’s intelligence army, the Special Ops unit, was used to play an active role in regional and provincial gatherings of the ANC in the run-up to Nasrec ‘to ensure certain outcomes’. A report by former minister Sydney Mufamadi, who was appointed by Ramaphosa months after he became president to investigate the State Security Agency, revealed that the SSA had become ‘extensively embroiled in the politics and factionalism of the ruling party’ and there was ‘naked politicisation of intelligence in recent years’. Agents loyal to Zuma also infiltrated and penetrated groupings they believed were anti-Zuma and spent state funds on political activities for his benefit. Money from the agency was used as a political slush fund. Indeed, insiders at the agency believed that the looting of state funds by the intelligence agency was far worse than state capture by the likes of the Gupta family.
In the run-up to the elective conference in 2017, Ramaphosa claimed to have been personally affected by rogue elements in the intelligence sector loyal to Zuma when emails between him and alleged lovers were made public. These were published in September 2017 in the Sunday Independent, whose editor, Steve Motale, later endorsed Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, Ramaphosa’s rival for the ANC presidency. Ramaphosa claimed that the email leak was a hack by the intelligence agencies. ‘It is evident that there is a well-resourced‚ co-ordinated covert operation underway to prevent those responsible for wrongdoing from being held to account and for the integrity of our law enforcement agencies and other state institutions to be restored. This operation appears to have access to resources within intelligence circles with the capability to intercept communications and hack private emails,’ he said in a statement at the time. Ramaphosa sought unsuccessfully to interdict the paper from publishing details of an extramarital affair he had had, but then later publicly admitted to it, saying it had ended eight years previously.
The campaign to discredit Ramaphosa continued when the ‘Weekly Exposé’, a website run by Kenny Kunene, a close friend of Steve Motale and an ally of Zuma in his last days as president, began publishing the leaked emails in all their sordid detail. It was also alleged that Ramaphosa had had affairs with young women for whose studies he had paid. He denied this in an interview with the Sunday Times and was adamant that this was all part of a dirty-tricks campaign against him. ‘We now need to confront the likelihood that state agencies and resources are being abused to promote factional political agendas. We also need to confront the reality that those behind these agendas will go to any length to protect themselves and their interests. We need to ask who these people are. And on whose behalf they act‚’ he said just three months before the Nasrec conference.
Later, the former head of the Independent Police Investigative Directorate (Ipid), Robert McBride, said he believed money from a contract irregularly awarded by the police had been laundered for the purpose of purchasing votes at the ANC’s national conference in December 2017. The allegations were detailed in an explosive affidavit deposed to by McBride. While that matter is yet to be concluded, Ramaphosa’s allies believe that when he assumed office, he was determined to fix the State Security Agency, which had become politicised to its core. At some point, an insider in Ramaphosa’s presidency noted, he even considered shutting down the agency.
When the report on the SSA by Sydney Mufamadi landed on his desk in December 2018, it confirmed what he had always believed. Subsequently, Ramaphosa announced in his 2019 state of the nation address the re-establishment of the National Security Council, in a bid to better co-ordinate the country’s intelligence and security-related functions. He himself would chair the council. Ramaphosa said he would also re-establish the two arms of the intelligence service: one focusing on domestic and the other on foreign intelligence.
For Ramaphosa now, his survival as ANC party president largely hinges on his success in cleaning up the security agencies and ridding them of Zuma loyalists. In his opinion, intelligence agencies have no place in politics. This was manifest when he publicly contradicted claims by Ace Magashule, made before the 2019 elections, that his phone was being tapped by state agents. For Ramaphosa, any attempt to suggest he might use the SSA or the security organs of the state for political gain, as Zuma did, must be denied. Time will tell whether he can resist this temptation during his tenure as president should he ever have to fight for his own political survival.
Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.
Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».
Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.
Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.