State capture enablers Tom Moyane, Nathi Nhleko lead MK Party coalitions negotiating team

State capture accused former Sars commissioner Tom Moyane and disgraced former police minister Nathi Nhleko are part of the MK Party’s negotiating team which met the ANC on Friday.   

Insiders privy to the meeting said the two have been appointed to negotiate with the ANC and several other parties about a coalition in both the national and provincial governments. 

TimesLIVE understands the two men, together with MK Party secretary-general Sihle Ngubane met the ANC at The Capital hotel in Sandton on Friday.

Insiders said the MK party had another meeting with the EFF’s team of negotiators on the same day.   

The MK Party is shopping for partners to govern in KwaZulu-Natal after pushing aside the ANC from the number one spot in the province.

The party fell short of 5% of the vote to gain a majority in the province.

It previously indicated it would not work with President Cyril Ramaphosa . However sources close to the negotiations said that the party did not make this demand during its first meeting with the ANC.   

The ANC announced on Thursday that it would invite all parties to participate in a government of national unity (GNU) after a one-day special NEC meeting held on Thursday. 

The ANC is understood to have held marathon meetings with several parties including the DA and PA on Friday to present the offer and the modalities it would entail.

Nhleko was police minister during former president Jacob Zuma’s tenure.

He defended Zuma during the Nkandla upgrades scandal and told parliament that research from his department concluded a pool at Zuma’s home costing more than R3m was a fire pool and not a swimming pool.

The Constitutional Court found the government irregularly used public funds to upgrade Zuma's home.

Nhleko withdrew his ANC membership claiming the party’s current values and principles were not aligned to his. He later joined the MK party.

Moyane, another Zuma loyalist, was found to have led the hollowing out of the revenue services during his tenure. He was fired by Ramaphosa after recommendations by retired judge Robert Nugent during the Sars inquiry.

Nugent found that Moyane and Boston-based consultancy Bain & Company colluded in a seizure of Sars.

Meanwhile a grouping of small parties is requesting a meeting with chief justice Raymond Zondo on the formation of a GNU.

The parties, which include Bosa, the UDM, ACDP, PAC and UAT, say that political parties should convene a meeting that will address the challenges of the envisaged government and give fulfilment to the constitutional inheritance as enshrined in the founding pillars of the constitution and by extension, the Constitutional Court.

“Given the new terrain where no one party has an outright mandate to form a government, it is imperative that a critical meeting be convened promptly.

This meeting must serve as a platform for fostering a transparent collaborative agenda for South Africa.

“With the landscape of governance evolving, characterised by shifting alliances and the absence of a clear majority, it is essential to establish a framework for inclusive decision-making. We, the representatives of various political parties represented in the parliament of South Africa, write to you as the custodian of the constitution and the vision espoused by the Constitutional Court with a sense of urgency and deep concern regarding recent developments in our nation's political landscape,” the parties wrote in a letter to Zondo.

They argue that the process of arranging a GNU cannot be left to the ANC to lead and convene but must be a collection of many stakeholders in collaboration.

The ANC has called for a national dialogue between parties and stakeholders after the election of a new president.

Parties have only nine days to agree on a coalition arrangement after the ANC failed to retain its majority in the polls.

TimesLIVE