Cyril gives nearly R2m of his salary to Madiba fund
President Cyril Ramaphosa yesterday announced that he would contribute half his annual salary for 2018 to the Thuma Mina Fund, in honour of South Africa’s founding father Nelson Mandela.
Delivering his budget vote in the National Assembly, Ramaphosa made a “citizen’s appeal” for others with the means to contribute.
“This is a private, citizen-driven initiative that will ask all those with the means to contribute a small portion of their salaries to supporting the many small projects that build the nation,” he said.
“I have decided to contribute half my presidential salary to a fund to be managed by the Nelson Mandela Foundation ... and will direct resources to the many small social projects scattered across the country.”
Ramaphosa’s annual salary amounts to approximately R3.6 million, which means his donation would be worth R1.8 million.
The president also recently launched the ANC’s Thuma Mina campaign, following his quoting of the popular song by jazz legend, Hugh Masekela, in his State of the Nation address earlier in the year.
The party has dismissed allegations that the campaign is an electioneering strategy, saying is fulfilling its mandate to deliver services.
The Thuma Mina Fund will be launched on July 18 – the 100th anniversary of Madiba’s birth.
Ramaphosa also used his speech yesterday to announce that former judge Robert Nugent will chair a commission of inquiry into tax adminstration and governance at the South African Revenue Service (Sars).
The terms of reference for the commission will be gazetted soon.
The commission is the result of the revenue service missing its target this year, reporting a revenue shortfall of R800 million.
“We have also taken steps to address the leadership challenges at Sars, including the suspension of the commissioner, the initiation of a disciplinary process and the appointment of an acting commissioner,” Ramaphosa said referring to the March suspension of Tom Moyane as Sars commissioner.
Ramaphosa also said municipalities and state-owned companies must expropriate and release unused land for housing the country’s urban, landless poor.
“Municipalities and stateowned enterprises need to release unused land and service sites for housing so that our people must have houses; so that they do not resort to self-help measures through the illegal occupation of land.
“We condemn illegal land occupation and rather redirect our people to go to land that would be made available to them as our municipalities take land through either expropriation or other means, so that it can be put to good use in the hands of our people.”
Because President Cyril Ramaphosa is such a stark contrast to his predecessor Jacob Zuma, one must exercise care when assessing what he has done and what he plans to do and one must guard against what has been labelled “Rama-phoria”. But, we cannot help but look with approval at the symbolic gesture he has just made: to pledge half of his annual salary to the Thuma Mina (Send Me) Fund in honour of Nelson Mandela.
It is a symbolic gesture because Ramaphosa is a billionaire in his own right and the about R1.8 million he will be committing is a small drop in a very big financial ocean for him.
Nevertheless, it is the principle which we admire. Ramaphosa’s message emphasises that politicians – and civil servants, for that matter – are there to work for the people of the country, and not to grow fat off the labours of those people.
We saw exactly the opposite in the Zuma years, with the outrageous Nkandla homestead being the worst example.
Now, we call on Ramaphosa to continue to work in that spirit and cut back on the perks for politicians.
A good start would be to chop the ridiculous “blue light brigades”.