SYMBOL OF HOPE for ordinary citizens SYMBOL OF FEAR for political thieves
Thuli Madonsela set a new standard for public probity in SA — and helped many along the way
MR K walked into the public protector’s office in Pretoria, yelling and shouting.
The Mpumalanga resident wasn’t angry at Thuli Madonsela for finding that President Jacob Zuma was liable for a portion of the R246-million the state spent on his private residence. Mr K was frustrated because he had been homeless for seven years — despite having reported his eviction from his home to the public protector.
When it became clear Mr K had lost his home, the government promised to allocate an RDP home to his family.
“I said to him: ‘I thought you had a house,’ ” Madonsela recalls.
“He said: ‘I do have a house, but I can’t go to it because it’s in Jupiter.’ “At that stage I thought Jupiter was a suburb in Mpumalanga and it’s too far from where he’s living and that’s why he can’t occupy it. And he laughed at me. It was a long story. There was no house and there were a lot of stories.”
To cut a long story short, Madonsela intervened. And this week Mr K was handed the keys to a new home.
Mr K’s story would never make headlines in national newspapers, but his case is one of 16 000 “Gogo Dlamini” cases Madonsela has resolved in the past financial year.
The “Gogo Dlaminis” are ordinary people inspired by Madonsela’s reputation for investigating impropriety without fear or favour. Madonsela has become a symbol of hope for many South Africans who had lost faith in the fight against corruption and maladministration.
She is admired by many citizens who have more belief in her office than they have in law enforcement agencies.
During an interview in her second-floor office in Hatfield, Pretoria — possibly her last as public protector — Madonsela beams as she relates the struggles of ordinary people.
These are the kinds of cases she counts as the highlights of her seven years as public protector.
In line with parliament’s recommendation, Zuma is expected to confirm Advocate Busisiwe Mkhwebane to fill the post Madonsela has made her own.
“The highlights of the past seven years were the things that were happening behind the scenes,” Madonsela says. “Reconciliation and mediation with government [on complaints] reported by ordinary people.”
But not all cases had happy endings.
Madonsela remembers with regret a Mrs Mdladla who had asked her to intervene when the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration improperly removed her as a part-time commissioner. She had been sick during the investigation, and died just as the CCMA agreed to pay her.
“I couldn’t help wondering whether the stress of not having a job and an income had contributed to whatever illness she was already battling.”
But these were not the cases that kept Madonsela in the headlines.
Her office exposed a number of politicians who had abused their positions to improperly benefit themselves. Her scalps include the late co-operative governance and traditional affairs minister Sicelo Shiceka, former communications minister Dina Pule, former public works minister Gwen Mahlangu-Nkabinde and former national police commissioner Bheki Cele.
Shiceka was investigated for using state resources to visit his girlfriend in a prison in Switzerland. Pule was found guilty over a dodgy telecommunications contract involving her boyfriend. Mahlangu-Nkabinde and Cele were found to be in the wrong in a lease for new police headquarters in Pretoria.
Based on the findings of the reports, the president fired Pule, Mahlangu-Nkabinde and Cele.
“The impact there was to make members of the executive understand that like other state employees, privileges are defined and you can only take what you’re entitled to. You can’t take more. Even when you take what you’re entitled to . . . just because you’re entitled to stay in [a] five-star [hotel] it doesn’t mean you have to stay in five-star.”
Although most ministers complied with her office without any drama, some were not impressed with Madonsela.
She remembers Shiceka quibbling about the tone of her report.
“Another minister who complained over the issue of language was minister MahlanguNkabinde. But generally all ministers have been helpful. When they get involved . . . they bring maturity.”
But that maturity seemed to disappear when Madonsela released the contentious “Secure in Comfort” report, which found that Zuma had unduly benefited when nonsecurity features were added to his private home at Nkandla.
Madonsela recommended that Zuma pay back a portion of the R246-million. Instead, a new process was undertaken by Police Minister Nathi Nhleko, who found Zuma was not liable for any of the money spent at his rural compound.
Opposition parties took the matter to the Constitutional Court and Zuma was ordered to pay.
Zuma’s backers hurled all types of insults at Madonsela — with Deputy Defence Minister Kebby Maphatsoe even accusing her of being a US spy. State Security Minister David Mahlobo confirmed that the spy allegations against Madonsela were being investigated.
“What was sad is that my government decided to investigate. I was not informed that my government was going to investigate. I got it through journalists who said someone in government — I won’t men- tion who — told them he seriously believed I’m a spy. I thought that was the lowest point.”
Another traumatic moment for Madonsela was when her life was threatened — it emerged that a hit man had been hired to kill her.
“What was sad was not the allegations, but how they have been handled.”
Madonsela will vacate her office on October 15 and plans to do “civic work” and teach and practise law.
Will she rejoin the ANC, which she left in 2007?
“I left the ANC not because of any bad things. I left for professional reasons and those professional reasons remain . . . It was from a point of view as lawyers . . . you want to stay neutral.”
Her successor, Mkhwebane, has been accused by the DA of being close to Zuma. But Madonsela refuses to say if she is the right choice.
“I had a view, but it does not matter right now.”
Someone in government told them he believed I’m a spy. I thought that was the lowest point Privileges are defined and you can only take what you’re entitled to. You can’t take more
THIS just has to be deliberate. Thuli Madonsela, the public protector, has just 10 working days left in her job. Her term has expired and she is being replaced by Busisiwe Mkhwebane, until recently an analyst with the State Security Agency.
Mkhwebane’s appointment was not without controversy. The DA voted against her appointment because, it said, it had information that she had been a spy when she worked as an immigration official in our embassy in China.
I still don’t know what to make of that. How does a South African diplomat in China spy on China? What could we possibly want to know that they wouldn’t just tell us? I don’t think it’s important really.
What’s important is whether she is really up to one of the toughest jobs in South African public life. We all wish her well, of course, but Madonsela has done both Mkhwebane and the rest of us a huge favour by ensuring that the biggest scandal of our democracy — the looting of public resources and the capture of large parts of the state by President Jacob Zuma’s business cronies, the Gupta family — will be the first item the new public protector will have to deal with when she starts on October 3.
She’s done that by instigating an investigation into state capture in the dying months of her term and, now, by announcing she’ll publish it before she leaves. Seeing as we all now know that the public protector’s findings have the force of law, whatever Madonsela “finds” or “recommends” in her Gupta report will have to be done whether she is in office or not. It will not be pretty.
She will, for instance, have spoken to Deputy Finance Minister Mcebisi Jonas about the meeting with the Guptas last year when they offered him the job of finance minister. Jonas’s word is prima facie evidence enough that a corrupt act took place and which should be prosecuted. I reckon she will order it done.
Madonsela has also subpoenaed piles of financial information from the entire cabinet, an order with which they are obliged to comply, in order for her staff to be able to extend the investigation further after she has gone and in case her replacement doesn’t quite have the cojones to be so cheeky.
Mkhwebane has been a bit oversold. She is a “brilliant legal mind”, we’re told, and while that may be true its bearing on leading the office of the public protector is questionable. To do that you need first and foremost to be a leader.
I have not studied Mkhwebane’s career in detail but she is clearly short of leadership experience. She had led no investigations or teams when she worked in the public protector’s office before and her other jobs in government have been relatively junior.
Now she is elevated to the equivalent of a judge, or a judge president even, with a big and experienced team going off in all directions chasing down bad guys. For many people, a first instinct would be to stop everything and take stock. That would be wrong. The staff members Madonsela leaves behind are anxious and fearful. Some of them will remember mentoring young Busisiwe when she was first there.
She should try to hit the ground running, make her people feel appreciated and show that the heat on corrupt politicians and officials is going to be turned up and not down.
Madonsela’s little welcome gift, the Gupta investigation, will be neatly wrapped and waiting for the new public protector. It will represent the best possible chance for the best possible start for Mkhwebane.
She will need all the help she can get. The next few years, the last of the Zuma era, could be very ugly. Does he fight or flee? Either way, he’s cornered and the only politicians who honestly want him to stay in his job are Mmusi Maimane and Julius Malema. Trying to rescue the ANC with Zuma still at the helm or pulling some puppet successor’s strings will see the party lose its majority in 2019 to their parties.
Thanks to Madonsela, Mkhwebane’s character is going to be tested immediately and that’s good, because we need to quickly know where we stand. It is in the big ANC succession battle to come that laws and citizens’ rights will be trampled upon and that is when we are going to need a public protector with courage and integrity.
The next few years, the last of the Zuma era, could be very ugly. Does he fight or flee?