Mantashe left brave comrades to suffer alone
One of the strangest developments from the state capture inquiry was ANC chair Gwede Mantashe’s decision to publicly discredit the evidence of former MP Vytjie Mentor.
Mantashe told Eyewitness News that “the whole story is actually a fake” in response to Mentor’s claim that she informed him and his deputy about the alleged offer by the Guptas in 2010 to make her the minister of public enterprises.
Mentor was admittedly hazy on a number of details in her testimony and stated incorrectly that the ANC deputy secretarygeneral was Jessie Duarte. Thandi Modise was Mantashe’s deputy at the time.
But whether Mentor’s testimony is plausible or falsified is up to deputy chief justice Raymond Zondo to decide, not an ANC official.
It certainly should not be the person who tried to keep the lid on the state capture scandal until it exploded beyond his control. Some of the witnesses at the inquiry, as well as others who pushed back against the Guptas, say they reported their experiences to Mantashe. The response many received was that they should not do anything to cause “disunity” in the ANC.
Mantashe said this in November 2016 while explaining the ANC’s decision to rebuff calls for former president Jacob Zuma to step down. This was after the release of former public protector Thuli Madonsela’s report on state capture, which pointed to Zuma’s role in enabling the Gupta brothers’ improper control of the state.
“We took a decision that let’s work on the unity of the ANC because this organisation must be viable, united and strong. A fragmented ANC is bad for SA,” Mantashe said at the time.
Earlier in 2016 Mantashe announced that the ANC had shut down an internal investigation into state capture. “A number of comrades came forward on alleged business influence on state but only one could make a written submission,” he said.
Some senior ANC officials who responded to a call from the governing party to come forward with information say that they decided not to bother with written submissions because Mantashe was clearly not interested in pursuing the matter.
Even though he opposed the axing of Pravin Gordhan and Mcebisi Jonas from the finance ministry in March 2017 to hand over control of the National Treasury to the Guptas, he still believed the ANC should close ranks for the sake of unity. Speaking at an SACP national imbizo in May 2017, Mantashe said it was “very problematic” to put SA ahead of the ANC and this would “destroy the ANC”.
“I don’t believe in fragmenting the ANC and saying you are strengthening it. It is a theory based on building a wall, not a movement,” he said.
Seven months later he “Mantashed”. In his organisational report at the ANC’s 54th national conference, Mantashe questioned the party’s response to state capture — as though he had nothing to do with it.
“Society is currently engaged in a debate about state capture and how it hurts the economy and the reputation of SA as a country. Once more‚ our movement is [caught] flatfooted in this debate‚ because we are reducing it into a personal attack on those seen to be associated with the Gupta family‚” he said.
In January Mantashe dismissed talk that Zuma would be recalled. A month later, he publicly called on Zuma to resign or face the “vultures”.
“As a disciplined cadre of the ANC, you are given a chance to resign on your own. But if you lack discipline, you will resist.
“Once you resist, we are going to let you be thrown out through the vote of no confidence, because you disrespect the organisation and you disobey it. Therefore we are going to let you be devoured by the vultures,” Mantashe said.
He also led the ANC’s vacillation on the Zuma-Gupta scandal, helping to suppress the matter for the sake of party unity, then condemned its failure to manage it.
Mantashe knows how many senior ANC leaders were left crushed and humiliated by the way Zuma treated them in service of the Guptas. He did nothing to support them or to attempt to confront the hijacking of the state.
Now, when the country is hearing detailed accounts of what the Guptas and Zuma did, Mantashe rubbishes a witness’s testimony.
All the main witnesses at the state capture inquiry so far — Mcebisi Jonas, Mentor, Themba Maseko and Phumla Williams — are senior ANC members who fought for SA’s liberation.
The party has done nothing to support its members who are testifying. It has not encouraged its senior deployees who aided the state capture project to step forward to confess their roles.
As a result, the perpetrators, some of them members of the national executive committee, feel no pressure to admit their collusion with the Guptas.
Jonas, Maseko, Mentor and Williams testified because of their personal courage and principles. Their evidence at the Zondo inquiry is assisting to piece together how state capture was executed and provided a cathartic release of the burden they carried.
There are many other people who have knowledge of state capture, either through resisting or aiding it. They should follow the example of the brave people who have so far come before judge Zondo. If Mantashe has finally decided what his position is on state capture, he should step forward to testify.