RUMBLE IN THE GNU JUNGLE ANC VERSUS DA @KASIBC_AFRICA
ONLINE EDITOR @KASIBC_AFRICA
Madam Speaker,
Yesterday, President Cyril Ramaphosa put South Africa’s future at stake.
Shortly before Cabinet met yesterday, he informed me that he intends to remove Andrew Whitfield as Deputy Minister of Trade, Industry and Competition.
I requested twenty-four hours to speak to Whitfield and my party.
However, before I could even do so, just three hours later, Whitfield received a letter informing him of his removal.
The apparent reason for this sudden and ill-considered decision is that Whitfield did not obtain permission to travel abroad earlier this year.
But the facts contradict even this flimsy reasoning.
In fact, on 12 February, Whitfield had written to the President requesting permission to travel to the United States, as required by the Ministerial Handbook.
Ten days later, he had still not received any response from the presidency, and departed on the trip.
Whitfield subsequently wrote to the President to apologise if it caused offence.
Again, he received no response.
Then yesterday, months after the incident and without a further word on it, the President unilaterally removed a DA Deputy Minister without even giving his largest coalition partner the courtesy of discussing the issue.
According to the President’s spokesperson, this move is also not part of a broader reshuffle.
There is no other conclusion to be drawn than that this is a calculated political assault on the second-largest party in the governing coalition.
To make matters even worse, this drastic unilateral action appears to be the product of a flagrant double standard.
While a DA Deputy Minister is removed for not getting a response to seeking permission to travel, Thembi Simelane remains in Cabinet despite being implicated in the VBS lotting.
Nobuhle Nkabane remains in Cabinet despite apparently misleading Parliament over an attempt to deploy corrupt cadres to SETA boards.
Serial underperformers, as well as people implicated in state capture, continue to sit around the Cabinet table.
Instead of being summarily fired, Simelane was merely asked to submit a “report” on the allegations against her to the President and moved to another portfolio.
In the past, even Ministers who had serious Public Protector findings were merely admonished or had their pay docked.
David Mahlobo is implicated in the most serious corruption by the state capture commission, yet he continues in the position as Deputy Minister of Water and Sanitation.
Yet a DA Deputy Minister is dismissed with the flimsiest of excuses?
The people of South Africa are expected to accept that the likes of Simelane, Nkabane and Mahlobo are protected, while Andrew Whitfield is removed?
But perhaps there is something even deeper at play here.
Like all DA Ministers and Deputy Ministers, Andrew Whitfield was succeeding at his job.
He had opposed an attempt to make suspect appointments, he was standing in the way of the looting that will follow from the Transformation Fund – and all of this in a department mired in corruption allegations involving the tender for the National Lottery.
Given this flagrant double standard, one is left with no choice but to conclude that hardworking DA Members of the Executive are now being fired for fighting corruption, not for committing corruption.
For being good at their jobs, rather than being incompetent.
If this situation is not urgently corrected, it will go down as the greatest political mistakes in modern South African history.
The DA therefore call on the President to fire Simelane, Nkabane, Mahlobo and other ANC Ministers and Deputy Ministers implicated in corruption within the next 48 hours.
If they fail to do so, the ANC will inflict grave consequences on South Africa.
Make no mistake about it: what happens next is entirely on the ANC and President Ramaphosa.
They did not have to do this.
They triggered all of the events that follow.
Should the ANC fail to meet our ultimatum, all bets are off and the consequences will be theirs to bear.
Madam Speaker,
It would be very easy for a party that has been treated with such disdain from an irresponsible coalition partner, to vote against this bill today.
But, precisely because we are nothing like the ANC, the DA will always put South Africa’s interests over narrow politics.
We will vote for DORA today not for politics, but for South Africa.
With this vote, we are demonstrating just how different the DA is from the ANC.
We are responsible custodians of executive power.
Even under the most difficult of conditions, we can always be trusted to put the people’s interests first.
We love South Africa too much to act in insecure and petty ways that risks the future of all 62 million people in this beautiful country.
However, this is the moment of truth.
Within the next 48 hours, we will find out if the DA stands alone as the only party that can be trusted to govern responsibly and take South Africa forward.
Thank you.
