Cyril Ramaphosa abuses state resources to defy Zondo and defend ANC cadre deployment

21 July 2022

Please find attached a soundbite by Dr Leon Schreiber MP.

The DA can today reveal that Cyril Ramaphosa, in his capacity as President of South Africa, has chosen to actively oppose the DA’s court case to abolish cadre deployment corruption. In legal papers that the DA received yesterday, Ramaphosa, Minister of Public Service and Administration, Thulas Nxesi, and the entire Government of South Africa announced that they “intend to oppose” the DA’s court case seeking to declare ANC cadre deployment unconstitutional and unlawful, as recommended by Chief Justice Raymond Zondo in the final volume of the State Capture Report. See the notices to oppose here and here.

This marks a hugely significant moment in the DA’s ongoing war against cadre deployment, because it reveals three facts.

The first is that Ramaphosa’s decision to formally defend cadre deployment in court in his capacity as President of the country – not as President of the ANC – confirms beyond all reasonable doubt that he has no intention of meaningfully eradicating state capture. The State Capture Commission that Ramaphosa previously professed to support found that cadre deployment facilitated state capture through “the appointment of pliant individuals to powerful positions in state entities.” Yet now that the Commission has implicated the ANC cadre deployment committee that he chaired during the Zuma years, Ramaphosa, his party and his entire Government are clearly hell-bent on defying the Zondo Report in order to protect ANC cadre deployment – the very foundation of state capture.

It is hard to overemphasise the significance of this point: the ANC and the entire South African Government have effectively drawn a defensive laager against the DA in an attempt to protect the very ANC policy that the Government’s own State Capture Commission identified as the cause of state capture corruption in that same Government.

Ramaphosa and his Government’s opposition to the DA’s case in his capacity as President of South Africa also amounts to an abuse of public resources to protect ANC cadre corruption. The DA’s court case centres on the policy of a political party that has devastated state capacity. A President who cared more about our country than about his political party would welcome the DA’s court case as a critical component in rebuilding state capacity by insulating the state against political interference. At the very least, a President who was sensitive to the damage wrought by cadre corruption would have indicated that he would simply abide by the court’s decision.

Instead, Ramaphosa and the South African Government have chosen to actively abuse state resources in order to protect a corrupt policy of a political party. In the notice of his intention to oppose the DA’s case, Ramaphosa even indicated that he will be represented in the matter by the State Attorney of the Republic of South Africa. He has thus instructed the State Attorney – which is supposed to serve the needs of citizens rather than political parties – to spend millions of Rands in court to defend the ANC.

Cyril Ramaphosa is blatantly abusing state resources, and the hard-earned tax money of South Africans, to defend in court the corrupt ANC cadre deployment policy that facilitated state capture. As he has done so many times before, he and his Government have shamelessly chosen the corrupt interests of ANC cadres over the needs of the South African people.

Finally, Ramaphosa’s abuse of state resources to defend ANC cadre deployment in defiance of the Zondo Report confirms that the DA is the only party that is putting its money where its mouth is when it comes eradicating state capture root and branch. It is only the DA that has mobilised resources and gone to court to implement Chief Justice Zondo’s finding that cadre deployment is unconstitutional and unlawful. With the ANC firmly united across all factions in defence of cadre deployment corruption, the DA stands alone among parliamentary parties in seeking to eradicate the policy that laid the foundation for state capture, corruption and state collapse. Ramaphosa’s announcement yesterday also makes it clear that the DA stands against not only the entire ANC, but also the President and the entire Government of South Africa.

While we may be the only political party in Parliament working to abolish cadre deployment, we know that millions of South Africans are united with the DA in their desire to see an end to the cadre corruption that has brought our country to its knees. It is for them that the DA will fight this battle against Ramaphosa, his Poverty Cabinet and the entire ANC to the very end. It is for the people of South Africa that we will defeat this treacherous attempt by Ramaphosa to protect the evil policy that has brought such profound suffering to millions of South Africans.

Above all, it is because the DA cares about the future of our beautiful country that we will not stop until cadre deployment is abolished and eradicated.

Issued by Leon Schreiber, DA Shadow Minister for Public Service and Administration, 21 July 2022