ANC not walking the talk

Just when many were beginning to believe that President Cyril Ramaphosa’s Thuma Mina drive is moving the country and the governing party towards a better path, the actions of the past few days prove true the old dictum that the more things change, the more they stay the same.

With Ramaphosa came the promise of a government and ANC that are responsive and sensitive to the public’s concerns and demands.

But all the talk of “humbling” themselves and being “ready to listen to the people” is fast proving to be just that – talk.

At the conference in which Ramaphosa was elected party president, there were promises that the ANC would no longer wait for drawn-out court processes before taking action against members who are accused of wrongdoing. Much was made of the fact that the party was planning to give more teeth to its “integrity committee”.

But, instead of former Gauteng health MEC Qedani Mahlangu being hauled before this committee for her role in the deaths of more than a hundred patients as a result of the Esidimeni debacle, she gets rewarded by being re-elected into the Gauteng ANC executive committee.

Mduduzi Manana, the former higher education deputy minister, finally resigned his seat as an MP following months of refusing to do so despite calls for him to do so from the public.

His resignation, however, does not appear to be motivated by remorse. The timing suggests that he quit only to avoid being censured by parliament’s ethics committee.

Like Mahlangu, Manana does not see it fit to fall on his sword after being found guilty of wrongdoing. He confessed to beating up two women at a club last year and yet continued to believe that he is fit for public office.

Instead of quitting parliament, he went on to avail himself for reelection in the ANC’s national executive committee.

He succeeded.

While condemning Manana and Mahlangu for not showing remorse by quitting, we must also ask tough questions of the ANC and the delegates who insisted on electing them into these positions of responsibility despite their wrongdoing. Only a party that takes voters for granted would do such a thing.