Andile Nkuhlu: Backer of Mbeki who made millions out of empowerment deals
1970-2015
LARGER-THAN-LIFE CHARACTER: Mark Behr ANDILE Nkuhlu, who has died in Johannesburg at the age of 45, was never far from controversy.
He was a well-connected mover and shaker in the ANC Youth League, a close friend of corporate crook Brett Kebble, and one of then-president Thabo Mbeki’s loudest and most enthusiastic praise singers.
He helped to lead the failed campaign to have Mbeki reelected as president of the ANC for a third term at the party’s Polokwane conference in 2007.
By encouraging Mbeki to believe he would win, he contributed to the president’s humiliation and ultimate expulsion as president of the country.
Right up to the eve of the election, Nkuhlu, whose uncle Professor Wiseman Nkuhlu was Mbeki’s economic adviser, continued to persuade Mbeki that he was ahead on points and would defeat his rival, Jacob Zuma.
When Mbeki was “recalled” as the country’s president in 2008, Nkuhlu, a member of the ANC provincial executive in the Eastern Cape, became a founding member of COPE, and chairman of the party in the Eastern Cape.
When the party began imploding after the 2009 elections, Nkuhlu returned to the ANC in time for its national conference in Mangaung. He was a key campaigner for Sports Minister Fikile Mbalula in his bid to unseat Gwede Mantashe as secretarygeneral.
Nkuhlu was one of the top leaders of the youth league in the Mbeki era, and made millions out of government tenders and selling special access to the government. He was a regular at the youth league business networking lounge during ANC conferences.
One of the league’s clients and business partners was Kebble. On the night he was shot dead in his car in an alleged assisted suicide in 2005, he was supposedly on his way to have supper with Nkuhlu. Nkuhlu was vocal in stating that he had not believed the assisted suicide theory “for one moment”.
“This was pure assassination. MOVER AND SHAKER: Andile Nkuhlu during the first policy congress of the ANC splinter party COPE in 2009, which he joined after Thabo Mbeki lost out to Jacob Zuma There is no doubt about it,” he said at the time. He was one of the first to arrive on the scene after he had heard the news.
He lavished praise on Kebble, calling him a true patriot who embraced the new era and was committed to the “unique values” of the country and to transformation. Indeed, he said, it was Kebble’s commitment to transformation that had made him so controversial.
Nkuhlu helped carry his coffin down the steps of St George’s Cathedral in Cape Town.
It emerged later that he and fellow leaders of the youth league had done extremely well out of Kebble, and out of the youth league’s investment arm, Lembede Resources, which held mineral rights worth hundreds of millions of rand, including a stake worth R195-million in several Kebble companies.
Nkuhlu was subsequently raided by the Scorpions in their search for the so-called “missing millions” Kebble had stolen from his companies.
Nkuhlu was a substantial shareholder in Itsuseng Investments, which owned half of Lembede, a subsidiary of Lembede Resources. When Julius Malema became president of the youth league, he labelled Nkuhlu and Lembede’s CEO, Songezo Mjongile, “thugs” and accused them of enriching themselves in the name of the league.
Nkuhlu became chief director of the Department of Public Enterprises in 1996 and was in this position when state-owned forestry company Komatiland was sold to empowerment company Zama Resources Corporation for R335-million.
The deal was cancelled in 2002 when it emerged that Nkuhlu, who was head of the bid com- mittee that recommended Zama, had received R183 000 from Zama and Lembede before the contract was awarded. The league had a substantial stake in Zama through Lembede.
Nkuhlu, who said he had no idea the money paid into his account was from Zama, resigned after the Public Service Commission recommended that he be charged with violating various public service regulations. He cited a breakdown of trust between him and the department.
More recently, Nkuhlu was a director in black empowerment holding company Genorah, which owned 60% of Nkwe Platinum.
Nkuhlu, who had been battling diabetes, was born on May 30 1970 in Kwazakhele township in Port Elizabeth.
He studied economics at the University of the Western Cape in Cape Town, and was Western Cape leader of the South African Students Congress.
He is survived by three children. — Chris Barron
He lavished praise on Kebble, calling him a true patriot