By Editorial
When President Cyril Ramaphosa announced last week that schools would once again close, the overwhelming public response was not to his government’s move to halt the spread of Covid-19 but his vow that law enforcement would go after those who had looted emergency funds.
We all collectively rolled our eyes, and many groaned “really?”.
His announcement came in the same week that his spokesperson’s husband was in line to receive a R125 million contract to supply the Gauteng Health Department with personal protective equipment.
While the money was never paid, the stench of impropriety was overwhelming, considering the close relationship Ramaphosa’s spokesperson Khusela Diko has with Gauteng Health MEC Bandile Masuku and his wife.
Diko and Masuku are members of the ANC’s provincial executive.
Considering that Ramaphosa came into power promising a “New Dawn” after years of profligacy by his predecessor, the scandal surrounding someone so close to him must be very painful.
While Ramaphosa has, of recent times, carefully cultivated the image of a saint, the same can’t be said for his comrades in the ANC.
As former minister of water and environmental affairs Nomvula Mokonyane testified last week, in a roundabout way, the spoils of lucrative tenders found their way into the coffers of the ANC. She was defending herself at the Zondo Commission of Inquiry into State Capture.
Mokonyane’s evidence was eye-opening because it showed the extent to which the lines between the state and the ANC have become blurred. It was expected that beneficiaries of government tenders had to support the ruling party.
Tenderpreneurs aren’t paying to support the ANC because of their moral convictions; it’s a quid pro quo relationship that ends once the ANC loses power. Consider the party’s desperation to collapse governing coalitions in Johannesburg, Tshwane and Nelson Mandela Bay.
Ramaphosa might lead the ANC but as we have seen with the feeding frenzy which accompanied the dishing out of Covid-19 contracts, there’s little he can do about the insatiable appetite for corruption which will ultimately lead to the demise of his party.