Maybe the ANC thinks people have short memories, or are forgiving of corruption. Perhaps, there are just no good men (or women) left.
President Cyril Ramaphosa has appointed former state security minister, Ayanda Dlodlo as South Africa’s new ambassador to France. Picture: Gallo Images / Sunday Times / Moeletsi Mabe
Victory is secured by fine margins.
Anyone who has been watching the World Cup will know that a missed penalty, a red card, or a last-minute strike can mean the difference between heading to the next round and being on a flight home.
And at a time when the stakes are highest, the ANC has pulled people off the bench that even the worst Bafana Bafana coach would not gamble with.
Just days after President Cyril Ramaphosa, captain of the ANC “in renewal,” announced the shocking decision to appoint Dina Pule as social development minister, he repeated the trick by pulling Ayanda Dlodlo out of relative obscurity to make her an ambassador.
Maybe the ANC thinks people have short memories? Or because the party was “born in the church”, we should be forgiving of the alleged corruption and gross dereliction of duties their cadres have stained South Africa with.
As communications minister from 2011 to 2013, Pule’s department was riddled with scandal and widespread mismanagement. She was also lambasted by Parliament’s ethics committee for hiding her relationship with businessman Phosane Mngqibisa, who received millions in contracts from the government that were allegedly channelled to companies linked to him.
She was fired from cabinet in 2013 and 13 years later replaced an ANC minister, Sisisi Tolashe, who had her own skeletons. Pule also now has a budget of over R300 billion and the responsibility for overseeing more than 25 million social grant recipients. Her role requires selflessness, compassion, and charity towards those most in need -none of which her previous scandals have shown she possesses.
The neglect of her department in the 2010s is rivalled by the sheer delinquency Dlodlo showed as State Security minister when an uprising literally set the country on fire in July 2021. Her department had been caught asleep at the wheel, and it was clear that her head was on the block. Her department was moved into the presidency a month later, and she resigned shortly after.
Are these really the people to fix the problem?
As a cost-of-living crisis spirals out of control and more South Africans turn to the state for help, and at a time when South Africa needs to put its best foot forward internationally to beat off genocide and xenophobia claims, you have to question Ramaphosa’s thinking in these appointments.
What consultation, board, task team, or commission that Ramaphosa loves using so much would ever dare even agree that this would be a good idea?
Perhaps there was manipulation or sabotage from his party, meant to make him look incompetent as he heads off into the sunset. Or perhaps it was self-sabotage by a president who has long since given up on the politics of governing.
As one expert pointed out to The Citizen this week, at least former president Jacob Zuma was in control of the corruption in his Cabinet and beyond. Ramaphosa seems to have just let it run amok and rely on slogans.
Any good men (or women) left?
Or perhaps it is as simple as this: there are no more good leaders left in the ANC.
Decades of patronage and cronyism have created a small political circle where positions are recycled, and the politically dead are resurrected. For all the promise of its OR Tambo School of Leadership, the ANC has failed to push the next generation of politicians to the fore.
Instead, young leaders find their paths blocked by old cadres who insist that they haven’t eaten enough from the trough, and those who genuinely want to make a difference are simply silenced.
Divisions exist in a big way in the ANC, as they do when recycling. But at least with recycling, there is a greater good.
