Yes – no more rogue ministers

PRESIDENT Cyril Ramaphosa used the ANC’s final rally before tomorrow’s general elections to make some bold statements and promises.

Buoyed by the polls, which show a victory for the ruling party, although with a reduced majority, Ramaphosa told thousands of the party faithful that he is not going to appoint leaders involved in wrongdoing and corruption into his new Cabinet.

The president will now have a firm mandate to do his work from citizens after the provincial and national elections.

For quite some time, Ramaphosa has been walking a tightrope in his presidency, after being voted in by party delegates at the organisation’s national elective conference in December 2017.

This was, in part, because he did not score a convincing victory over his detractors in the party.

Since then, Ramaphosa has been engaged in a tough balancing act to ensure that he doesn’t rock the boat and anger his opponents in the party. Consequently, the president’s Cabinet still has questionable and rogue characters who are embroiled in allegations of state capture.

The assembly of the new executive will be a litmus test for the president.

It will show whether he will continue to walk on eggs and appease his opponents with Cabinet posts, or whether he will use it to signal the “New Dawn”.

Indications are that Ramaphosa is not going to have it easy.

Comments by ANC secretarygeneral Ace Magashule that state organs were being used in a fight for control of the party showed the deep levels of divisions in the party, which continued to play out just before the elections.

It is clear that after the elections Ramaphosa will face some form of rebellion from his detractors in the party.

The question, therefore, is whether the president will capitulate amid threats from his nemesis and continue to house in his Cabinet rogue ministers, or will he stamp his authority by assembling a team of men and women who have the interests of this country at heart.

It is important for the president to deliver on his promise to clean up the Cabinet – and hold to account those involved in wrongdoing – as this will be an indicator of his real intentions going forward.