Gordhan and Duarte: Zille says ‘ANC race-baiting’ has turned on its own

A front page story in The Sunday Independent accuses Minister of Public Enterprises Pravin Gordhan of being on an “anti-black crusade” through involvement in appointing white people to key positions at state-owned enterprises while sidelining their black competitors.

On Saturday, reports surfaced about comments made by ANC deputy secretary general Jessie Duarte the day before. She slammed her own party for being “racist and tribalistic” at a memorial for late struggle icon Albertina Sisulu.

Democratic Alliance (DA) federal council chairperson Helen Zille came up with a theory on social media linking the two matters.

“Interesting to watch how ANC race-baiting is now biting leading ANC figures themselves, such as Jessie Duarte and Pravin Gordhan,” she said.

“The ANC has ridden the tiger of racial-scapegoating for 25 years. That tiger is now eating its own.”

This echoes DA interim leader John Steenhuisen’s reaction to the Duarte comments. He said Duarte should not be “surprised” that her party is “racist and tribalistic”, as it has “driven nothing but a race-based agenda for the past 25 years”.

READ MORE: Steenhuisen says Duarte shouldn’t be surprised the ANC is ‘racist and tribalistic’ 

Duarte in particular mentioned what she sees as racism to so-called coloured and Indian people from within the ANC.

Zille was reacting to tweets from Pravin Gordhan’s spokesperson, former journalist Sam Mkokeli, tweeted from his protected Twitter account.

He shared the cover of the Sunday Independent article, and in another tweet shared the cover of the newspaper from a year prior – another story about Gordhan – with the caption “The more things change…”.

The story in today’s edition of Sunday Independent is co-written by Mzilikazi wa Afrika, on of the journalists who left the Sunday Times after it apologised for and retracted its reports on the so-called Sars “rogue unit” after the press ombudsman declared them  “inaccurate, misleading, and unfair”.

Wa Afrika’s colleague Piet Rampedi, another of the journalists involved in the retracted rogue-unit stories and currently the head of investigations at Sunday Independent has since alleged that this is a fight-back campaign led by Gordhan and propagated by the media, in tweets the Sunday Times has said they will take legal action for, declaring them defamatory and false.

Interesting to watch how ANC race-baiting is now biting leading ANC figures themselves, such as Jessie Duarte and Pravin Gordhan. The ANC has ridden the tiger of racial-scapegoating for 25 years. That tiger is now eating its own

— Helen Zille (@helenzille) November 24, 2019

(Compiled by Daniel Friedman)

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