Eliminate the impression of wrongdoing, Mr President
22 August 2019
The relentless saga surrounding the CR17 presidential campaign's funding is still in full swing. For ordinary South Africans, it is clear that the Public Protector (PP) has it in for President Ramaphosa and some of his supporters, especially Pravin Gordhan and Derek Hanekom. And the leaked information about the donors and recipients of some of these funds raises quite a few questions.
The President's Office (and the ANC) insists that there was nothing wrong with the campaign and its funding, that the receipts and expenses were properly audited and that no law, parliamentary regulation or code was violated. And technically they are right, and a number of commentators and legal experts have already confirmed that. In addition, it is clear that the PP's investigative mandate only applies to public funds and that she therefore had no right to investigate the CR17 campaign's fundraising - despite her argument that in the case of "money laundering" she does have investigative power. It's also as clear as daylight that, to say the least, the PP is extremely selective in her investigations, focusing almost exclusively on the ANC's Ramaphosa side and leaving the Zuptas in peace.
One could add that the PP maintains that the information about the donors and beneficiaries obtained from the Financial Intelligence Center (FICA) was legitimate and that it did not leak it to the media. But the question is, how does FICA get hold of email correspondence? At least FICA does not seem to be the only source, which highlights the PP's previous connection with the State Security Agency. Another interesting question is what would happen if a court found that she had no power to investigate CR17 (because it was not about public funds) and the court therefore found her report invalid. Then that information is already in the public domain - and therefore illegally obtained. It is likely that for this reason that the Court granted the Ramaphosa application to seal the information until the case on the legality of obtaining the information comes before the court.
Unfortunately, this is not where the importance of the matter ends. Experienced and honest SACP leader Jeremy Cronin (also a Ramaphosa supporter) recently wrote that it is a "matter of grave concern" that DA leader Mmusi Maimane's campaign raised R100 million and that it is "highly problematic" that the CR17 campaign raised almost half a billion rand. According to him, however, this "business money" in party political campaigns is something quite different from stripping government of billions of rand.