MBOMBELA – The premier, Mr David Mabuza, lives in a precarious world.
He made time to speak to the media on Wednesday night, following a day-long meeting of the Premier’s Coordinating Forum (PCF) with government representatives on water provision. The extended meeting resulted in a six-hour wait for journalists.
Lowvelder had been trying to arrange a one-on-one with the premier for months.
Mabuza spoke about his suspicion that he had been poisoned, and accused the media of having been insensitive to his illness and “pestering” his office with questions about his state of health. He said he had not fully recovered from the illness that struck him down last year.
“I am still on heavy medication, but I think we’re getting there. From where I’m coming from, I see a huge difference.”
Mabuza said it took doctors a long time to discover the source of his malaise. “Finally they all said there is bacteria in your blood, it has spread all over your blood. Well, they have got a name, I forgot the name.
“It was discovered I swallowed it through a fluid. This bacteria was in a hot fluid. Because its time of reaction was quick. The way it set in in my body was very quick.”
He said he started showing symptoms of poisoning on the last Saturday in August, while he was attending his birthday celebration in Bushbuckridge. By that Monday he had an upset stomach and the following day he felt exhausted. He was subsequently hospitalised.
Mabuza believes he was deliberately made ill, but he hasn’t approached the police with his suspicions.
“For me to open a case would be very difficult, I am not very sure whether the police would try to make head or tail of this.”
Does he believe that an ANC party member tried to kill him? “I’m not trying to say that,” he said.
He did, however, concede that he had enemies, both visible and unseen.
“Given the position I am holding and kind of reaction – there were people that came out and said no to this person coming for the third time, and they were not happy about that. Those are the people that came out in the open to say about their unhappiness about my coming for the third time.
‘But there are many people in politics that they might be enemies without me knowing. On a daily basis I am working with people, I am taking decisions about people. Some I discipline at work and all over, where I am responsible.
“I might not be sure of the environment in which I live. Whether I’ve created enemies. But I’m aware that I have people who don’t like the decisions I take. People don’t like what the PGC announced.
“I remember there was a group who called themselves Save the ANC Mpumalanga. Saying Mpumalanga must be saved from Mabuza who wants to come for a third term.”
Given the unhappiness, how did he manage to be re-elected as provincial chairman, unopposed?
“Well, I was out for a long time. When I came back the decision was taken that the conference must go ahead and I went to the conference. People in the main were not happy about a few things that happened while I was away.”
He remains unhappy with the media’s handling of the situation.
“There was a moment when Ligwalagwala FM read in the news that I am late; that I have died. Everyone was surprised. That message reached me in hospital. I was asking myself, why? Where is this information coming from? You could see people deliberately distorted that I am dead. I just wonder what was the intention of that person?
“I received your questions in hospital, like you’re trailing me, wanting to know where I am, whether I’m alive or I’m dead. It was like a surveillance, I was really tortured by your actions. It was not normal. I am very disappointed.
“Asking in my office in a manner that is unusual in a situation where someone is sick. You were asking as if it was just another matter.”
The Office of the Premier, as well as the ANC, and then acting premier, Mr Vusi Shongwe, repeatedly told the media Mabuza was fine and “resting” at home.
https://www.citizen.co.za/lowvelder/297239/premiers-office-remains-mum-on-illness/
- Also read: Mpumalanga premier’s sick leave: day 60
Mabuza said he looked forward to squaring off with Dr Mathews Phosa in court later this year.
“More or less I could trace the origin of the document. I made a claim and opened a criminal case. Somewhere during the course of this year we are going to court for the first time.
“I don’t know who is the source of that allegation to say so and so, what I can tell you is that I received this document from Luthuli House to say Mathews Phosa has sent this document. All I know is that this document is coming from Phosa. And this document is talking a lot of concoction that will prove to be wrong.”
