The South African Council of Churches’ report into state capture conducted after the revelations by the former deputy finance minister, Mcebisi Jonas, laid bare the reality that organised crime syndicates are in command in South Africa. We are living in a Mafia state.
It is now clear why 80% of the ANC national executive committee (NEC) does not want President Jacob Zuma to step down. Many are captured and compliant as proxies, lieutenants and instruments of this Mafia state.
This is why they are against the commission of inquiry into state capture proposed by the former Public Protector, Advocate Thuli Madonsela, to be conducted by one judge appointed by the Chief Justice, Mogoeng Mogoeng.
They know they too could feature strongly in that report.
On-again off-again Eskom CEO Brian Molefe, Eskom board chair Dr Ben Ngubane and the current Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba: these names feature throughout the SACC report.
From the time Gigaba was minister of public enterprises to his present position at the ministry of finance – following the chopping down of Pravin Gordhan and Jonas – he has featured as a central figure in the state capture roll-out.
The deluge of e-mails known as Guptaleaks now being made public has shown that it was on Gigaba’s watch that Home Affairs facilitated the placing of Gupta-linked immigration officials in India where they fast-tracked visas for the Guptas as they moved family, staff and business associates between Dubai, India and South Africa. This included providing visas for Indian nationals employed by the ANN7 TV channel in South Africa.
And as Public Enterprises Minister Gigaba was the one who appointed Brian Molefe to Transnet as chief executive in 2011 – before Molefe moved to Eskom and then parliament last year.
Gigaba also appointed, among others, Iqbal Sharma‚ who is close to the Guptas‚ to the Transnet board‚ where he oversaw procurement.
Now with Gigaba as a finance minister we must surely brace for the worst for the country: maybe the ultimate loss of our sovereignty under the colours of the ANC.
It is no longer a secret or supposition that organised crime is taking over the state apparatus, removing competent civil servants and replacing them with a gangster-style goodfellas.
For ANC stalwarts it is almost beyond comprehension that the majority of the current ANC NEC can pretend to be loyal to the ANC, or defending the party while knowing very well that they are actually loyal to the Guptas and not the principles of the ANC.
The ANC is lost and maybe for good, like the National Party of Hendrik Verwoerd, BJ Vorster, PW Botha and FW de Klerk. It might never recover, unless it faces up to the need for a radical transformation of itself to save itself – for starters a total overhaul of the way we elect members of parliament.
The failure of the NEC to rein in Zuma is the worst betrayal of all. It is the responsibility of the NEC to hold the president accountable to the policies of ANC, as set out in the document “Through the Eye of the Needle”, which requires unquestionable conduct and maximum discipline from leaders. They are expected to be exemplary.
What example is the president showing when he instructs Themba Maseko to help the Guptas? The NEC was supposed to call him to order. But what do they do? They support him as he breaks each and every principle of the ANC.
What example are they setting?
This is the worst betrayal, comrade secretary-general Gwede Mantashe. Never deceive yourself and blame others for your own shortcomings. Take responsibility for the mess happening in front of your eyes.
Can members of National Assembly save the day?
It is now left to ANC MPs to save the country from the continued looting of the country under the leadership of President Zuma whilst the SG and his colleagues in the top six appear paralysed and helpless. Ideally, they should have reined in the president. They should have pulled him into order, but like other cowards they too kept mum. But since the NEC supported the president, never mind his trampling on the constitution, it is left to ANC members of the National Assembly to remove him from office.
These ANC MPs are being told not to betray the ANC or Zuma. But truth be told, Zuma has betrayed the country by handing over power to the Guptas under the nose of the SG.
What is your understanding of the worst betrayal comrade SG, if handing over power to a foreign family is not the worst?
If ANC MPs vote with the opposition to remove Zuma as the country’s president, that will be good for the country because the SG has failed the country to stop Zuma and family from looting state assets.
The ANC top six should have stopped him from destroying the country and the ANC, and it would have saved the MPs from being a last line of defence of the constitution and having the task of removing President Zuma.
Of course the terrible flaw in South Africa’s electoral law, makes the ruling party MPs captives of Luthuli House, since they are all appointees from party headquarters, which can remove any of them in a second. Their careers, their salaries and their pensions are hostage to the secretary-general, acting as the president’s fixer-in-chief.
None of our MPs are directly elected by the people so they have none of the protections that a constituency system gives by law to MPs until the next election.
So, instead of creating brave and independent-minded representatives of the voters, our political system has created a culture of political slavishness in the National Assembly which should shame every black person in this country.
Was it all for this that the ANC was founded 105 years ago?
We have now regressed to a situation where democratic mass action by the people themselves outside parliament is the only way to win universal franchise, though this time we need action that is peaceful and constitutional.
We must rely on the collective power and wisdom of the masses to save the country and the ANC.
We have no option but to continue organising mass actions to remove Zuma at the earliest possible time and also to reform the electoral laws.
I speak of mass actions similar those organised by the United Democratic Front in the 1980s which will help conscientise the population to the fact that the way forward is to establish a properly constituted constitutional democracy through electoral reform.
By reforming the electoral laws we will empower the population to elect and select the best candidates from the population to lead the country in all the respective spheres of state and government. We must establish individual accountability of politicians without exception.
The fundamental issue is to establish individual accountability from the bottom up: ward councillors, mayors, the provincial members of parliament, the premiers, national MPs and the president at the top. Every politician must be held individually accountable by his/her local community in the area where he/she comes from.
This is why I propose a system of large multi-member constituencies (MMCs) in line with the recommendations made by Dr Frederik van Zyl Slabbert’s electoral task team report of 2003.
That task team recommended that 75% of MPs should be elected directly by constituencies and 25% elected in the current manner, by proportional representation.
Local party branches will then have a level of power they have never had since 1994; to select candidates they know and trust to stand for election to provincial legislatures and National Assembly, and whom they can de-select at the next election if their candidates fail the people.
In this way, the voters will get final choice of who becomes an MP, not Luthuli House, and the integrity of the MP will be protected by the constituency, not pawned out to the Guptas.
This is the only way to render ineffective the impact of fraud and gerrymandering in internal party elections, going on to affect the national politics. We will then be able to eliminate the impact of vote-rigging within political parties, as happens now as a matter of routine within the ANC.
South Africa will then be able to begin to regain its lost moral integrity – something that now lies trampled in the dirt.
Omry Makgoale is rank and file member of the ANC. This is his personal opinion
Only way to fix betrayal of worst order
It is now clear why 80% of the ANC national executive committee (NEC) does not want President Jacob Zuma to step down. Many are captured and compliant as proxies, lieutenants and instruments of this Mafia state.
This is why they are against the commission of inquiry into state capture proposed by the former Public Protector, Advocate Thuli Madonsela, to be conducted by one judge appointed by the Chief Justice, Mogoeng Mogoeng.
They know they too could feature strongly in that report.
On-again off-again Eskom CEO Brian Molefe, Eskom board chair Dr Ben Ngubane and the current Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba: these names feature throughout the SACC report.
From the time Gigaba was minister of public enterprises to his present position at the ministry of finance – following the chopping down of Pravin Gordhan and Jonas – he has featured as a central figure in the state capture roll-out.
The deluge of e-mails known as Guptaleaks now being made public has shown that it was on Gigaba’s watch that Home Affairs facilitated the placing of Gupta-linked immigration officials in India where they fast-tracked visas for the Guptas as they moved family, staff and business associates between Dubai, India and South Africa. This included providing visas for Indian nationals employed by the ANN7 TV channel in South Africa.
And as Public Enterprises Minister Gigaba was the one who appointed Brian Molefe to Transnet as chief executive in 2011 – before Molefe moved to Eskom and then parliament last year.
Gigaba also appointed, among others, Iqbal Sharma‚ who is close to the Guptas‚ to the Transnet board‚ where he oversaw procurement.
Now with Gigaba as a finance minister we must surely brace for the worst for the country: maybe the ultimate loss of our sovereignty under the colours of the ANC.
It is no longer a secret or supposition that organised crime is taking over the state apparatus, removing competent civil servants and replacing them with a gangster-style goodfellas.
For ANC stalwarts it is almost beyond comprehension that the majority of the current ANC NEC can pretend to be loyal to the ANC, or defending the party while knowing very well that they are actually loyal to the Guptas and not the principles of the ANC.
The ANC is lost and maybe for good, like the National Party of Hendrik Verwoerd, BJ Vorster, PW Botha and FW de Klerk. It might never recover, unless it faces up to the need for a radical transformation of itself to save itself – for starters a total overhaul of the way we elect members of parliament.
The failure of the NEC to rein in Zuma is the worst betrayal of all. It is the responsibility of the NEC to hold the president accountable to the policies of ANC, as set out in the document “Through the Eye of the Needle”, which requires unquestionable conduct and maximum discipline from leaders. They are expected to be exemplary.
What example is the president showing when he instructs Themba Maseko to help the Guptas? The NEC was supposed to call him to order. But what do they do? They support him as he breaks each and every principle of the ANC.
What example are they setting?
This is the worst betrayal, comrade secretary-general Gwede Mantashe. Never deceive yourself and blame others for your own shortcomings. Take responsibility for the mess happening in front of your eyes.
Can members of National Assembly save the day?
It is now left to ANC MPs to save the country from the continued looting of the country under the leadership of President Zuma whilst the SG and his colleagues in the top six appear paralysed and helpless. Ideally, they should have reined in the president. They should have pulled him into order, but like other cowards they too kept mum. But since the NEC supported the president, never mind his trampling on the constitution, it is left to ANC members of the National Assembly to remove him from office.
These ANC MPs are being told not to betray the ANC or Zuma. But truth be told, Zuma has betrayed the country by handing over power to the Guptas under the nose of the SG.
What is your understanding of the worst betrayal comrade SG, if handing over power to a foreign family is not the worst?
If ANC MPs vote with the opposition to remove Zuma as the country’s president, that will be good for the country because the SG has failed the country to stop Zuma and family from looting state assets.
The ANC top six should have stopped him from destroying the country and the ANC, and it would have saved the MPs from being a last line of defence of the constitution and having the task of removing President Zuma.
Of course the terrible flaw in South Africa’s electoral law, makes the ruling party MPs captives of Luthuli House, since they are all appointees from party headquarters, which can remove any of them in a second. Their careers, their salaries and their pensions are hostage to the secretary-general, acting as the president’s fixer-in-chief.
None of our MPs are directly elected by the people so they have none of the protections that a constituency system gives by law to MPs until the next election.
So, instead of creating brave and independent-minded representatives of the voters, our political system has created a culture of political slavishness in the National Assembly which should shame every black person in this country.
Was it all for this that the ANC was founded 105 years ago?
We have now regressed to a situation where democratic mass action by the people themselves outside parliament is the only way to win universal franchise, though this time we need action that is peaceful and constitutional.
We must rely on the collective power and wisdom of the masses to save the country and the ANC.
We have no option but to continue organising mass actions to remove Zuma at the earliest possible time and also to reform the electoral laws.
I speak of mass actions similar those organised by the United Democratic Front in the 1980s which will help conscientise the population to the fact that the way forward is to establish a properly constituted constitutional democracy through electoral reform.
By reforming the electoral laws we will empower the population to elect and select the best candidates from the population to lead the country in all the respective spheres of state and government. We must establish individual accountability of politicians without exception.
The fundamental issue is to establish individual accountability from the bottom up: ward councillors, mayors, the provincial members of parliament, the premiers, national MPs and the president at the top. Every politician must be held individually accountable by his/her local community in the area where he/she comes from.
This is why I propose a system of large multi-member constituencies (MMCs) in line with the recommendations made by Dr Frederik van Zyl Slabbert’s electoral task team report of 2003.
That task team recommended that 75% of MPs should be elected directly by constituencies and 25% elected in the current manner, by proportional representation.
Local party branches will then have a level of power they have never had since 1994; to select candidates they know and trust to stand for election to provincial legislatures and National Assembly, and whom they can de-select at the next election if their candidates fail the people.
In this way, the voters will get final choice of who becomes an MP, not Luthuli House, and the integrity of the MP will be protected by the constituency, not pawned out to the Guptas.
This is the only way to render ineffective the impact of fraud and gerrymandering in internal party elections, going on to affect the national politics. We will then be able to eliminate the impact of vote-rigging within political parties, as happens now as a matter of routine within the ANC.
South Africa will then be able to begin to regain its lost moral integrity – something that now lies trampled in the dirt.
Omry Makgoale is rank and file member of the ANC. This is his personal opinion
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