Ramaphosa is cleared on campaign donation
• Judgment another blow to Mkhwebane’s credibility as she faces steps to remove her from office
The high court removed a large cloud over Cyril Ramaphosa’s presidency by setting aside public protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane’s report that he had lied to parliament and won the leadership of the ANC on the back of a campaign tainted by money laundering.
Since Mkhwebane issued the report in July, its findings have been used by Ramaphosa’s detractors as a political weapon as they sought to undermine his anticorruption credentials.
While it delivered an emphatic victory for Ramaphosa, the judgment was another blow for Mkhwebane’s credibility as she faces possible removal from office by a parliamentary inquiry. The DA’s bid to oust her is largely based on previous blistering judgments that raised questions about her competency, honesty and partiality in dealing with politically charged cases.
Tuesday’s judgment, delivered by a full bench in Pretoria, trashed Mkhwebane’s
2018 the year the president answered a question in parliament on a big donation by facilities company Bosasa
findings against Ramaphosa and declared them unlawful. The judges set them aside along with the remedial action she had ordered against the president.
“The public protector acted unlawfully in exercising her powers in the manner that she did in this matter.”
The remedial orders included instructions to the national director of public prosecutions Shamila Batohi to investigate possible money laundering, and to parliamentary speaker Thandi Modise to refer Ramaphosa’s nondisclosure of donations to the joint committee on ethics.
While Ramaphosa has made boosting SA’s economy and creating jobs one of the key goals of his presidency, he has had to divert his attention to persistent court battles with Mkhwebane.
The public protector has been accused of being used to fight ANC factional battles, which she has denied.
The struggles have focused attention on battles within the ANC, with investors spooked by the possibility that an adverse outcome for Ramaphosa could lead to him being undermined, and even removed, by opponents believed to be loyal to former president Jacob Zuma.
The case has its genesis in an answer Ramaphosa gave in parliament to a question by then DA leader Mmusi Maimane in 2018 about a payment made by scandal-plagued facilities company Bosasa to his son, Andile.
Ramaphosa initially said the company had paid Andile a fee in terms of a consultancy contract.
He later wrote to then parliamentary speaker Baleka Mbete to “correct” his statement, saying the money had been a donation from Bosasa CEO Gavin Watson to his campaign for the ANC presidency. Watson died in a car crash in 2019.
The ANC said the judgment would allow for focus to turn to governance and ways to boost the struggling economy.
“We are quite confident at the conclusion of this case it will now be all hands on deck. Our focus on the national agenda will be reinforced so that we pursue what is primary – to resolve the issues for our people on the ground,” spokesperson Pule Mabe said.
Gauteng judge president Dunstan Mlambo and judges Elias Matojane and Raylene Keightley did not mince words in their near 100-page ruling.
They said Mkhwebane did not have the jurisdiction to look into the donations, as it dealt with private, and not public money. In detailing why the public protector’s office was ordered to pay the president’s costs on a punitive scale, the court said Mkhwebane had acted irrationally and “recklessly” in reaching her conclusion that there was prima facie evidence of money laundering in the CR17 campaign.
The court said Mkhwebane’s conduct was made worse by her refusal to give the president an opportunity to respond to the remedial action.
At the very least, the judgment said, she had failed to show appreciation for a basic principle of due legal process.
The court found that she had ignored evidence at her disposal over the campaign donations, and in doing so, she had breached “her duty to approach every investigation in an openminded fashion”.
Oupa Segalwe, spokesperson for the public protector, said the ruling was “disappointing” for the public protector, though it would not be advisable for her to give a knee-jerk reaction before studying it with her legal team.
The EFF, which joined the case in support of Mkhwebane, said it rejected the ruling, “which has absolved Ramaphosa from accountability” and it would approach the Constitutional Court to appeal against the judgment.