We will probe the secret reprimand of rogue minister Mosebenzi Zwane

14 November 2016

Today, President Jacob Zuma announced that the Minister of Mineral Resources, Mosebenzi Zwane, had been reprimanded for his “midnight statement” calling for the establishment of a Judicial Commission of Inquiry into the termination of financial services to Oakbay Investments (Pty) Ltd.

Replying to parliamentary questions on the matter President Jacob Zuma simply stated: “I reprimanded the Minister of Mineral Resources for the statement.” However, we cannot sit back and allow the minister to be let off the hook with what amounts to a secret rap over the knuckles.

We have to get to the bottom of why President Jacob Zuma: failed to make any public statement following the reprimand of the minister; whether the reprimand included a “letter of reprimand”; and if it did, why the “letter of reprimand” was not tabled in Parliament.

After all, the “letters of reprimand”, sent to ministers implicated in the Nkandla scandal, were tabled in Parliament.

I will, therefore, submit a further parliamentary question to President Jacob Zuma probing all the particulars of his secret reprimand of the minister for his role in calling for the establishment of a Judicial Commission of Inquiry into the termination of financial services to Oakbay Investments (Pty) Ltd.

In the end, what President Jacob Zuma should have done was to fire the Minister of Mineral Resources, Mosebenzi Zwane, who behaves less like a minister, acting in the public interest, than a “hired gun”, acting in the private interest of his most important clients: the Guptas.

Issued by David Maynier, DA Shadow Minister of Finance, 14 November 2016